Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: senior vs. multigen

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

> On Feb 25, 2017, at 3:06 PM, Beverly Jones Redekop <beverly.jones.redekop 
> [at] gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> We're having conflict between empty nesters and parents in our community,
> three to five years in.
> 
> What would have helped? (I'm a 40-something mother of three sons 4-12)

This is not a criticism — just a noting that this is how things are and how 
parents view the situation:

Everything in this email is directed to curtailing children’s noise and running 
(which also produces noise).

Nothing is directed toward the needs, beliefs, and opinions of the over 50 
crowd.

Very quickly our population is moving to over 50. My concern is that if they 
pull out to senior cohousing, those under 50 will be left with a lot of work, 
particularly child rearing, that will be unsustainable.

But still, where are the organized programs and specifically designed spaces 
that address the needs/desires of the over 50 and over 70.

Yesterday I sat in a workshop on baking sourdough bread. Everyone else was in 
their late 20s to early 30s. At 75, I was totally bored with their conversation 
which centered on their approaches to having new babies. This is a topic of 
interest to me but they want to “do it themselves” and distrust any advice or 
experience sharing from someone who has done this themselves or shared the 
experience with others. 

We don’t have a tradition of learning from seniors. We only think about keeping 
it quiet for them.

Again, this is an observation, not a criticism. We don’t know how to do this. 
How can those who want an adult environment be portrayed not as curmudgeons or 
physically debilitated but as wanting conversations to focus on world affairs, 
for example.

Sharon
----
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org