As a senior citizen in the twenty first century, I’ve to manage not solely with the bodily ageing course of but in addition the continuous adjustments to the world as I knew it.
My eyesight dims, listening to is lowered, psychological processes decelerate. Throw in different age-related well being issues equivalent to hypertension and this senior citizen is not the brisk, succesful particular person I as soon as was.
Fifty years in the past, in my early teenagers, change was gradual and constant. It was simpler to adapt to and settle for it. Charles Darwin identified that species change, adapt and survive slowly over millenniums.
Today, change appears the one fastened characteristic in fashionable life. Now I appear to see and expertise change on a practically each day foundation.
The greatest change I’ve needed to cope with is know-how in all its types. Just think about the variations in my life. In my youth, telephones had been fastened strains. Now it’s arduous to stay with out a cell phone. Televisions had been cumbersome, black and white. Today, color televisions are slim and laden with options. Even automobiles are digital and, better of all, they even communicate to you!
So, how will we seniors cope with all this alteration? Well, a minority embraces change fervently, desirous to discover and study new issues. The majority of us should be pulled, with ft dragging, into the brand new period. Then there’s a small group that refuses to budge, who stubbornly refuse to be a part of this altering panorama. They choose being dinosaurs!
I used to be one such dinosaur. I used to be virtually dragged screaming into utilizing the pc for work. The old style typewriter and Gestetner curler printer had been phased out and I needed to set my examination papers on the pc. Necessity makes a unusual bedfellow and in 1997, on the age of 47, I purchased my first pc.
As I struggled to manage with the pc and lastly accepted its usefulness, the cell phone was making its approach onto the scene. I refused to be cowed into shifting on. I remained a dinosaur. One excuse was that not having a cell phone stored me out of vary of the “instant” calls for of my headmaster. The actuality was that I used to be afraid of studying to make use of this new device. Even extra, I used to be afraid to point out I didn’t know how one can use it and appear to be a idiot.
Sadly, many senior residents fall into this class. Once the masters of their area, competent and educated, many people really feel out of our depth with new know-how.
At dwelling with paper, e-book and libraries, we’re shocked on the immediate information discovered on the faucet of a finger. We are distrustful of this and once more ashamed to ask the keen beaver, impatient younger folks round us for assist. It is really easy for them however it appears to take a whereas for ageing seniors like us to know and retain how one can ship messages, how one can ahead, how one can Skype or worst of all do Internet banking or funds!
Banking is not what it was once. ATM playing cards and pin numbers are a necessity. As we age, remembering pin numbers can change into a downside.
Just lately my financial institution knowledgeable me I would wish a pin quantity for the newest bank card. Internet banking is a fearful thought as I’m distrustful of the safety and afraid of tapping one thing incorrect and wiping out all my hard-earned cash.
Where as soon as I used to collect all my payments and head out to TNB, Telekom or Syabas to make funds, now it could all be accomplished on-line or by bank card. This is so impersonal. Paying payments made me really feel in management. I used to be impartial. It was additionally a time out. I went out, paid payments, then met mates for a meal or did a little bit of buying earlier than heading dwelling. Technology has taken away this objective in life.
What I feel I personally dislike is my dependence on the younger in this age of know-how! The position reversal, particularly for a instructor, just isn’t simple to just accept graciously, I have to say.
Where as soon as I used to be the one who knew virtually the whole lot, now I’ve to humbly ask these very younger folks (some even in major faculty) how one can use the sensible telephone or to nag them to come back and clarify why all my information has immediately disappeared.
It is galling, to say the least, when these younger ones with a faucet of a finger, click on the whole lot again to order.However, know-how is maintaining seniors like me mentally energetic. It is forcing me to just accept change and transfer ahead.
There are benefits in fact. Skype or Zoom permits me to work together and talk with members of the family abroad. The sensible telephone lets me make free calls domestically and internationally.
WhatsApp discussion groups assist seniors who’ve time on our arms to unfold messages quicker than wildfire! We study new vocabulary each day. Now phrases like obtain, ahead and put up are half and parcel of our each day vocabulary.
Seniors are not socially remoted. We don’t have to simply sit in entrance of a tv. We can supply data and work together, we will speak to and take heed to others.
We have found Mr Google and Dr Google. With a faucet on the sensible telephone, I can uncover if my signs are severe or I’m merely an ageing hypochondriac.
YouTube gives me with miracle treatment drinks or, if I’m feeling blue, a session with ABBA or the Bee Gees brightens the day.
We even have our personal assist teams to show each other how one can ahead messages, make calls and deal with this know-how. We can do all this with out asking “superior” grandkids or busy youngsters for assist! We can snicker at each other’s bumbling helplessness and humiliating errors as a result of every of us have gone via it.
My senior WhatsApp group begins the day with a flurry of Good Morning messages. It is sort of like a competitors to see who can ship probably the most inspiring or most stunning morning greetings.
Even higher, I imagine it has improved my relationship with varied members of my household. We now have time for one another that we didn’t as busy adults, and we don’t have to journey to KL or JB to take action.
I get pleasure from the concept I can maintain in contact with mates domestically and abroad. We talk about our each day actions – the small pleasures, triumphs and petty nuisances.
What is refreshing about this techno change is the brand new and simpler communication channel it has opened up for us.Technology has modified life as I knew it however by embracing change I imagine I’m main a much less remoted, and a extra purposeful and enriched life in my golden years.
