No one wants to move into an old age home.  A group of friends in Austin, Texas is building their own so they don't have to give up their lives and their friends as they age.  What they call the "Llano Exit Strategy" is a series of four tiny houses on a compound alongside the Llano River, with a larger communal area where one day a nurse might live to provide care.  We talked to one of the masterminds behind this, Jodi Zipp.  Learn more about Gracefully and hear more episodes at gracefullyradio.com 

Gracefully Episode 3: A new twist on the old age home

Jim Crowley remembers the old days, a time long ago, when he married a woman and had a family to conceal the fact that he was gay.  A time when, as a schoolteacher, he feared that people would learn his sexuality because of the inevitable discrimination that might follow.  There was no such acronym as “LGBTQ.” The word “gay” was a catch-all for anyone who wasn’t heterosexual, and most of all, it was a word whispered quietly.

Now, closing in on 80, and diagnosed with an illness that made it impossible to live at home alone any longer, this retired educator is thankful for the leaps and bounds in civil rights that have occurred in his lifetime. And, to have found one of the first assisted living facilities in the United States that aims to provide a safe, welcoming place for older gay people to spend their days with the care they need, and, as importantly, without fear of discrimination.

More at gracefullyradio.com

Old, gay, single-yet not alone

When applied to aging, the word “gracefully” doesn’t sit well with writer and editor Sy Safransky, who turned 71 a few days before we met him earlier this year in Los Angeles.  He was visiting from his long-standing perch in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where, in 1974, he founded the ad-free gem of a monthly magazine called The Sun.

I had a suspicion Sy would have strong opinions about aging.  You can read more at Gracefullyradio.com or hear our talk at the link above.

(photo by Rachel P. Elliott)

Gracefully: A legendary magazine editor weighs in on aging--gratefully

Would you take your clothing off on stage in a crowded theater?  At 57, LizAnne Keigley can't quite believe she's voluntarily agreed to disrobe publicly: "What the hell was I thinking, really?"

But she has a clear answer beyond the fact that it's part of her role in a new, staged version of Calendar Girls, based on the hit 2003 movie written by Julie Towhidi and Tim Firth that opens this week at Group Rep in Burbank.  Her decision has to do with a major transformation she's undergone that callenges conventional perceptions of aging.

Since she's lost 150 pounds these last years, Keigley's been feeling as if she re-set to a new beginning of her life.  Just at the stage when many people start to wallow in malaise over their physical state, Keigley is marveling at her newfound health and physique-and all the possibilities before her.

Hear my conversation on Gracefully with Keigley and fellow actress, 70-year old Cheryl Crossland, on how the show and getting naked in public has changed them. 

For details on the performances, visit http://www.thegrouprep.com

Photo credit: Peter Konerko

Gracefully: Mature women on their decision to publicly disrobe

Just across the street from the hippest, hipster-ist market in all of Los Angeles sit four hulking concrete buildings that serve as home to over a thousand elderly people.  People who’ve walked by them for years have no idea what’s inside. Angelus Plaza is, in fact, the largest low-income senior housing project in the nation.  Those who live there are the poorest of the poor, and qualify for rents that are a tiny fraction of market rate–usually just several hundred dollars.  Demand is so high for the rare vacancies that no waiting list is kept.

Gracefully: The Gardens Of Angelus Plaza

For the last 25 years, she’s taught hundreds of students at the Los Angeles Athletic Club.  She didn’t start practicing, much less teaching, until after her two kids were grown.

To this petite grandmother, age is immaterial: “I try not to look at my numbers,” she told me after one of the eight classes she teaches a week in the studio named for one of her mentors. “I lie about my age, my height and my weight, so don’t ask me.”

Those numbers don’t seem to matter, either, to the students who fill her classes, which provide rigorous workouts.

For more stories like this, visit graceofullyradio.com

Gracefully: A yoga teacher-and grandmother-on how not to grow old

Perhaps you are faced with a dilemma like the one we’re grappling with in my family:  What to do about an elderly relative, who lives alone-who needs help, but refuses to accept it?   For clues on how to navigate this situation, I leapt at the chance to speak to an expert, geriatrician Dr. Laura Mosqueda, chair and professor of family medicine and geriatrics at the USC Keck School of Medicine. graceofullyradio.com

Gracefully: Finding help for a relative who doesn't want it

You might think the last subject on the mind of a twenty-year old college student would be the challenges facing older women in society.

Not so those enrolled in Caroline Cicero's class at USC, Gero 435: Women and Aging.  The reasons young people study gerontology are as varied as people themselves.  Visit the class with me, and learn more on gracefullyradio.com

Gracefully: Study aging in college?  Why not?

For over 30 years, selected students from the USC School of Gerontology get to live at the Kingsley Manor Retirement Home in Hollywood in exchange for infusing the place with their youthful vigor.  One student teaches Zumba and leads a daily news discussion group; another leads residents in stretching and meditation; and a third, Chinese brush painting.  More on GracefullyRadio.com, your field guide to growing old.

Why these college students live in a retirement home

The legendary dancer Carmen de Lavallade embodies the word gracefully.  She’s 85, which seems unfathomable as she practically glides into the room with the spectacular posture and gleaming skin of someone far younger.  Is her endurance attributable to good genes, a lifetime of movement, of adulation and success, of an enduring love with a magnificent husband of sixty years, Geoffrey Holder?

Sitting with her on her recent visit to Los Angeles, I found it hard to get her to talk about her philosophy on her longevity. She was consumed by the place she’d come from before our meeting: Her high school, Jefferson High, and her concern for the students.

(Read more at GracefullyRadio.com)

Gracefully / The 85-year old dance legend

Veteran journalist.  Author.  Curious person. Aspiring humanitarian.  Swimmer.

Lisa Napoli