Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Fifty Plus Cohousing

[racheli (racheli]

Hi Anne,
What strikes me as strange about what you're saying is
how much  you consider age to be the (?) major factor in
determining whether people are "different" or "alike".
By calling it "strange" I don't mean to deman it, I'm just
aiming to underline how different it is from my own 
experience.  I've always found myself drawn to people
with age being the least of issues... (I have friends who
are 20 years younger than me, and others who are
a lot older) - I guess it makes it hard for me to understand
why age is such a decisive factor for anyone.  
I kind of suspect that once a 50+ cohousing is established,
some people will still feel lonely, some will feel they are
the unwelcome "fringe" etc., unless there is a determined
committment to work to address the needs of everyone.
But this same determination can make older people feel
at home at a "regular" cohousing, no?  Isn't the problem the
lack of deep committment to a kind of relationships where
such needs are addressed?

Just my musings.
I'd love to hear more from you (and others?) on what makes,
in your view, a certain age group distinctly different, 

Thanks,
R.
PS  Recently I gave a number of talks in Green Valley (which
is a large collection of retirement communities in Arizona).   I was
amazed/delighted by the vitality of many of these older people. (Most of
them were Unitarians, BTW :))  One of the major
organizers of this series of talks (on the Israel/Palestine conflict) was
a guy who looked like he was in his 70's, but turned out to be in his
90's: I found out that he was in the Lincoln Brigade and participated in
the Spanish Civil War!  How much I wish we had him in our community, so
that people, and especially the very young, could have the thrill of
finding out about his life first hand...

*****************************************



>Thanks to all of you who are into the inquiry about  Fifty-Plus Cohousing
>or  what might be called "Theme-centered Cohousing".  I posted the
>request  to  hear from people who might be interested in living with
>people who may be  retired or planning retirement.

-----------------------------------------------------------
racheli [at] sonoracohousing.com
-----------------------------------------------------------

_______________________________________________
Cohousing-L mailing list
Cohousing-L [at] cohousing.org  Unsubscribe  and other info:
http://www.cohousing.org/cohousing-L