They represent 12% of our population;
10 million of them are veterans;
20% of them have college degrees;
73,000 are now enrolled in college;
80,000 are over 100 years old;
5 million of them are 95 or older;
36 million of them are 65 or older;
72% of those aged 65-74 voted in recent political elections, representing the highest percentage of any group.
Who are they?
They are our seniors.
They are the group of people Americans pejoratively call feeble, doddering, rickety, senile, anile, decrepit, old geezers, old codgers.
They are the group heavily responsible for bringing America to its state of preeminence in the world, yet are forced to retire from work though they remain productive.
They are the group from which inclusive Pres. Obama chose but one to be in his Cabinet and to give him advice.
Many Americans have shamelessly bought into Art Linkletter's identification of the four stages of man: infancy, childhood, adolescence and obsolescence. He may have said it jokingly, though it is by no means a joke. They best be careful for it is not just the aged that are the victims of this depraved perception.
There are tribes and cultures in the world today, some as ancient as life itself, in which those with extensive life experience are not shuffled off to lifeless old age homes, but are revered and honored and respected and cherished and treasured, and beseeched for guidance and insight and enlightenment. Those are the more spiritual tribes and cultures, the ones who see beyond the physical constraints of aging to inner wisdom. They are the ones that value ideas and those who can gift them to you.
It is them we ought emulate as we remember the ancient teaching that the price of wisdom is above rubies.
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