Episode
266
Our best summers
Becky Blue | Geriatric nurse/writer
BY PETER BOWES | Monday December 23, 2024 | @peterbowes
What if the best days of our lives were to come in our 70s or later? The societal norms around aging are far from optimistic, preferring to frame the process around dotage and frailty. But such views are increasingly being challenged, not least because the evidence suggests we can be active, purposeful and fulfilled, well beyond the traditional age of retirement. In her book, Turning: The Magic and Mystery of More Days, Becky Blue delves into the emotional, physical, and psychological aspects of aging, offering a roadmap to a vibrant and meaningful life at any age. She encourages people, particularly women, to take control of how they grow older with a new perspective rooted in empowerment.
In this interview we explore Blue’s unique approach to aging, longevity, and how we can all redefine what it means to grow older.
CHAPTERS (time stamps go to YouTube)
- 00:00 Introduction
- 03:13 Is 60 really the new 60?
- 04:23 From geriatric nursing to writing
- 08:48 Images of what it’s like to be an older person
- 11:48 A positive aging mindset
- 15:11 Tackling agism
- 20:02 What does the word ‘old’ mean to you?
- 22:15 A friend from every decade
- 24:04 The best summers of your life.
- 29:15 Applying the lessons of aging wisdom
- 31:35 Cockeyed optimism about aging?
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Peter Bowes (00:22) Hello again, welcome to the Live Long podcast. I’m Peter Beaus. This is where we explore the science and stories behind human longevity with the goal of mastering the aging process. And I know I say that at the beginning of every episode, but I just want to labour the point of mastering the ageing process for this particular episodes I don’t necessarily believe in reversing aging or I’m not anti-aging or anti-aging I’m pro-aging mastering the aging process enjoying life as well as we can with optimum health and vitality maximising our health span and not necessarily thinking about lifespan just enjoying those vital years as long as we can and I say that for this episode because our guest is Becky Blue. Becky is the author of a wonderful book about aging that really puts the process into perspective. Becky, it’s great to see you. Thanks for joining us on the podcast.
Becky Blue (01:25) Thank you, Peter. It’s really fun to be here. And yes, I have a passion for aging with vitality and with vision. And I think a lot of the control is in our hands and it’s in our mindset, of course. and so I hope that really, this can be a great conversation for people our age, but what I like to say about aging is really applicable to any age because obviously we start aging as soon as we are born.
Peter Bowes (01:58) We do. And the title of your book really sums it up for me. It’s called Turning the Magic and Mystery of More Days. And I particularly like the use of the word magic there because it is an adventure, isn’t it, for all of us?
Becky Blue (02:14) It really is. And I went round and round about what to name the book, of course, and as anyone does. But magic to me really portrays that kind of, you know, you really can’t plan everything. And I think there’s a wonderful kind of serendipity that can happen as we go throughout our days, especially in this third act of life, when hopefully we maybe have a little bit more flexibility. I always say like that. Retirement is the end of routine, you know, that you don’t have to keep doing the same thing every day. And so let yourself be surprised. That’s one of the chapters in my book. And I think that magic kind of encompasses all of that.
Peter Bowes (02:54) Well, let’s start with the thing I just mentioned here. The TED Talk in which you start your talk about you refer to a party that you went to and celebrating a momentous big birthday for one of your friends and inevitably someone said, well, 60 is the new 40 and you cringed a little bit. Why was that?
Becky Blue (03:13) Yes. Well, it was kind of, you know, our, my first friend who was turning 60. So, you know, that was five years ago now, but at the time it was a big deal. And so we’re at a wine bar and everybody’s raising their glass and I knew someone would say it. And they said, 60 is the new 40. And I did, I just kind of cringed because I really had probably was just writing my book at the time. And I was probably actually writing 60 is not the new 40, 60 is the new 60. And I don’t think any of us who are in this age really want to go back to being 40. Maybe we do parts of it, but there’s parts of being 40 that require a lot of responsibility and busyness and activity and possibly children, whatever, lots of work obligations. So, 60 can look much different than 40 and it can be much better. And honestly, I would say that I feel better physically than when I was 40.
Peter Bowes (04:08) So Becky, are a retired geriatric nurse. Can you just give me a little potted history in terms of your career? You’re a writer as well. What brought you to this point in your career and especially your deep interest in the aging process?
Becky Blue (04:23) Thank you for asking that. Yeah, you know, I became a nurse like so many of us of my vintage graduated with my degree in 1981 and then went through a variety of different roles, but was always kind of drawn to those people who are in kind of that third act of life or even into more towards the end of life and just kind of having a real heart for that because from a nursing perspective. You’re really allowed to have much more independence or autonomy as a nurse when you’re working with that age group. And there’s so much to do with really looking at people as body, mind and spirit. And my last, probably last third of my career was in faith community nursing, where we put nurses into churches. And so I have a real passion for looking at people and body, mind and spirit. And I think the way that we look at aging today, if you would listen to most commercials or open a magazine or whatever, and I really appreciate your comment about we can’t prevent aging. It’s not like something you can just, you don’t wanna stop it, right? But I think that there’s often the piece that is left out is, you know, we look so much like the body, what does the body do while it ages? But to really help that body stay as active and as vital as it can be, you have to also feed your mind and feed your spirit. So it’s kind of a three legged stool, if you will, all those pieces need to be together. So to your question about how did I end up here, I’ve always kind of written in my life and actually through my career, I wrote a lot of grants and I wrote, just kind of kept up with my writing. But then to actually have time once I retired and it just kind of came as a idea that, okay, I’m going to turn 60. How about if I write about this and talk about my own aging in real time?
Peter Bowes (06:22) And one of the reasons that I talk a lot about not defying aging, not reversing aging, is that certainly I believe that part of the joy of aging is embracing the wisdom that we’ve acquired over the decades. The wisdom of what it was like to be 20, 30, 40, 50, and now in my 60s. And that that is something that you can’t manufacture. You’ve got to live it to appreciate it and then ultimately benefit from it. And I know you have said that you’d like to embrace being 90 by saying that 90 is the new 90. And it’s not necessarily the 90 that you might have envisioned, but it’s the 90 that you can make of it or the 60 that you can make of it because of who you are and what you’ve learned.
Becky Blue (07:10) That’s so true. And so even now in our sixties, we need to be, I don’t like to use the word planning, but anticipating or just, just know that if I’m blessed by turning 90, this is how I want to be. And so there’s a lot of things going back to kind of the physical health that you need to do now to make sure that you can get to 90 and be that new 90 that I want to be back at the wine bar with my girlfriends and toasting the new 90. And so I think it’s just a wonderful conversation that we all need to have. And I’ve so applaud people like you who put yourself out here with a podcast and get this information out because we need to be talking about it.
Peter Bowes (07:53) And you touched on this slightly a moment ago, but I’d to dive into it a bit further. The image of what it is like to be a certain age. And I think therein lies the problem that old people, and I say I use the word old, which probably isn’t the best word to use, I think, when we’re having this debate, but someone who is 60 or 80, that there is this image of what that person is like or is going to be like. And it’s an image that we start nurturing from children, from our own childhood, the image of what it’s like to be an older person, which understanding the science behind aging now and the benefits of a good diet and lots of exercise and all those positive lifestyle traits, that we are not that image of an older person that we might have had as children looking at our grandparents or great grandparents.
Becky Blue (08:48) Yes, I mean, I always think of that and I write about it in the book. And I think it’s a great conversation to have. Who are your role models of aging? And they’ve probably changed over the years. know, when I was young, I probably would say, well, it’s my grandma and she’s in her apron and she’s in the kitchen or she’s sitting in her chair. She’s just in those two places. She doesn’t go anywhere else. So I think that we have to realize that it’s us that are going to change the culture of aging and going to change those images that the younger people in our life have. And I love kind of that concept of how do you change culture? And one of the thoughts is you do story worthy things and then you tell those stories about yourself or you tell story worthy things about other people. And so I’ll just give this example. One of my book club events that I went to, one of the ladies sort of sheepishly raised her hand and she says, well, there’s a group of six of us and we get together every Wednesday, but we always say we have to do something different every Wednesday. We never repeat it. And she goes, last Wednesday, we all went to the ski hill and we didn’t ski, but we all went tubing down the hill. And so the idea of kind of these 70 somethings going down, it’s just so glorious kind of beautiful image, know, that it’d be, maybe it’s already been on a commercial, but it should be, you know, it’s just a great image of people having fun and doing something kind of unexpected. And so I asked her, said, okay, did you tell anybody about that? Did you post video of it on Instagram? Well, no, you know, so we’re the ones that have to start showing these stories because the other concern I have is that we tend to in our society today kind of stay in our little silos based on age, right? And so many children, in fact, I was just visiting with my grandchild who is in Los Angeles, so he’s very far from me. So many kids are not around older people. And so somehow we need to get those stories out about this is what 60 looks like, this is what 70, 80, 90 can look like. And so it’s really up to us. And I think we’ll have the most to gain by the time we turn 90, that we’ve kind of done this community work and advocacy at this point in our life.
Peter Bowes (11:20) I think you’ve just hit on a crucial point and that is telling the stories. Because if we don’t hear these stories, as you say, attitudes are not going to change. Those stereotypes are just going to prevail until we get to the kind of mindset that being 60, 70, 80, 90 can be like being… It’s going to be different, but it can be like in terms of the energy that we can bring to ourselves and to life. It can be like being 40 or 30 again.
Becky Blue (11:48) Yes absolutely. And just, I love this idea of mindset. And just last week, we actually were driving back from California and I was, we were road tripping through Wyoming and I was looking at this big expanse of prairie and thinking about Lewis and Clark or the Mormons and their hand carts, you know, and how brave and courageous and curious they were to go across this kind of vast almost kind of wasteland is what sometimes it looks like. but I thought, okay, this is a great image for aging. What if we all approached it with an explorer’s mindset that we don’t know what’s around the next river bend, but why don’t we just go find out and why don’t we take some people with us? You know, don’t do it by ourselves and don’t do it, in isolation, but whether it be things related to our body, we’re going to try some new kind of exercise thing. I just started taking ballet two years ago and it’s been a great joy for my life. Is it a mind thing? Are you interacting with younger people and learning some whole new technology that you didn’t think you’d, you’re learning about AI or whatever? Or is it spirit? Are you delving into some of the different world religions and finding out where it’s that deep meaning comes from? And so I think that explorer’s mindset is something that gets me excited now as kind of a nurse researcher. I’m going to dig into that a little more and maybe write about that.
Peter Bowes (13:18) And you, like me, believe I’m correct in saying you’re in your 60s now.
Becky Blue (13:22) I am. just had my 65th or my Medicare birthday, I guess you’d call it, right?
Peter Bowes (13:27) Yes, so we’re pretty close. I’m 63 in a few months time. So we’re fairly close. it’s interesting you should say that because we do tend to get to this decade, at least if you live in the United States and you think in terms of yes, there’s the Medicare age, which is for anyone watching this or listening to this around the world is essentially health insurance from the state, from the government, which you get for the first time. 67 being the generally accepted retirement age. It depends on your social security and we’ll not get into that because that’s too complicated.
Becky Blue (13:57) Exactly on’t ask me those questions.
Peter Bowes (13:59) No, exactly it’s a mystery to me as well how it all works. hopefully it does still work. but there are certain points that we get to in life that we believe we’ve kind of got to the next stage. And maybe that’s indeed part of the problem that we have these these milestones that might have been significant decades ago, but increasingly are not anymore. We can keep working, can’t we? For as long as we’re able.
Becky Blue (14:22) Oh yes. In fact, I went through this in my TED talk, you know, I think we just have always had kind of this view that, you know, you start as a school-aged child and then you kind of work your way up and, know, and for so long, maybe you even stay in the same job and then you get to like 65 and then, well then it’s just downhill from there. Well, what an image. I mean, that’s crazy. I would suggest more of a spiral or cyclical that if I’m 65 and I had a girlfriend just do this, who is a financial planner and she decided to go back and become a nurse, know, fantastic, why not? And so those bits, those different activities don’t have a certain time stamp on them. They can happen any time.
Peter Bowes (15:11) What about the issue, and I would say it’s quite a significant problem, of agism? There are lots of isms in this world and I often think of, I don’t know whether you’ll agree with this, that ageism is often the overlooked one and one that isn’t particularly taken seriously. And sometimes we’re all guilty of ageism towards ourselves? How many times do you hear someone say, I could no longer do this because I’m old or I couldn’t go there, I wouldn’t fit in because I’m old or I couldn’t have this position in my company because I’m too old? It’s something that holds people back, isn’t it?
Becky Blue (15:49) Yes. And I appreciate what you said, because I totally agree. I’ve often said, and it’s so trendy now to talk about different isms. I mean, it has been for decades, but the one ism that has never been really put away is ageism and it’s unfortunate. so, you know, my really, my bigger mission even beyond sharing my book with people is I want to change the culture of aging. And I think within that, I mean, if we were able to do that, then ageism should go away. But it’s something that can. You know, it’s been, we’ve been so programmed to know that, yeah, especially in America at 65 then, okay. You know, the big discussion then is, well, are you going to retire to, Arizona or Florida, you know, and how many times a week are you going to play golf? Well, there’s so many people who really have no interest in that. There’s probably people who are already in those situations who really have no interest in that. And we need to let people know that it’s there’s no expiration date on having, you know, maybe a new career or meeting, you know, making new relationships. It’s, so I think you’re right about maybe we shouldn’t even mark these chapters or these different milestones. It should just be life.
Peter Bowes (17:09) Yeah, exactly. And I’m curious what you think therefore, because ageism has been around for a long time. I think it’s as prevalent now as it always has been. How do you change it? I don’t see politicians talking about it, hearing them discuss it and debate it and putting it as part of a manifesto that we need to end ageism. Yes, sexism clearly has been and is an issue. Racism? It has been and still very definitely is an issue. we understand that. But ageism is just something that’s it’s almost laughed at sometimes as not necessarily being taken seriously.
Becky Blue (17:50) It is, or it’s, yeah. You know, I think we need to call it out. And, to your, one of the things I know my friends will never say around me is, I’m too old to do that. Cause they know I will call them on it. So if we can all start by just taking that out of our vernacular. But, again, I think it goes back to culture and a way to change a culture is to tell the stories. And so the more I look at people who are maybe a decade or a couple of decades ahead of me, that’s the kind of, honestly, that’s kind of the content I seek out on social media. There’s some wonderful people on Instagram who I follow who are aging in style and all those kinds of things. but yet I hope I, and then I try to suggest those to my children or to my friends who are young to experience, to actually see what can happen when one reaches those ages that for a young person have typically been very either scary or the other word I come up with was so often is that I think we kind of just make people invisible. You it’s not just ageism. It’s like, okay, well, let’s not ask, you know, they’re over this certain age or they’re retired. So now they’re, it’s almost like they’re not a part of society, right? And what a loss because you know, we have such a large group of people who are entering that third chapter of life, people who are still vital and healthy. And I tell a story in my book about my husband being asked to retire from a specific and I guess executive role. They were asked him to retire quite quite quickly as COVID approached, which was understandable. But I think of like the institutional knowledge that he had that was just kind of like, okay, bye. And I think we’ve got to find ways to capture that knowledge and experience and innovation and creativity and share it.
Peter Bowes (20:02) And as a writer, I’m curious about your view on this, the use of the word old. I said old earlier in this interview and kind of checked myself because it is very often times just used in a derogatory sense. even people in this longevity sphere, if you want to call it that, will sometimes pull back from using the word old and say, well, how young are you at the age of 70 or 80? Why not say how old you are? You might say to a 10 year old child, how old are you? Old doesn’t have to be associated with a negative situation, is my argument. That you might be 80 years old, but that’s a privilege to get to 80 years old and it’s something to celebrate and to embrace rather than something to shy away from.
Becky Blue (20:49) Yes, I would agree. I went through that a lot. Like when I started writing my book, I thought, am I supposed to like avoid certain language or whatever? And so I looked at a of a lot of people were using and, and, actually, you know, the book called turning the magic and mystery more days. I kind of liked the idea of that. I’m having more days. I’m not aging, but old is it defines it’s like the fact, you know, I just think, I don’t know how. I don’t try to avoid the word old. How old are you? Actually, my more favorite question though, and this is a really fun thing if you’re with your friends or around a glass of wine or something. I love to ask people, how old would you be if you didn’t know how old you were? And that can lead to some really fun discussions. And it says so much about how you’re feeling, I think, in body, and spirit.
Peter Bowes (21:36) Yeah, and I think the answer to that question almost always comes from the physical side of being. How old do you feel? And the mental side as well. There’s no account given to the decades that have passed, the number of birthdays. It is the here and now and how you feel. Something you said a moment ago, think that is really fascinating and important, is associating with people from other generations. And I think you write in your book about having some friends at least from every generation from 30s, 40s, 50s and back to younger people in your life because, well you tell me how beneficial can that be?
Becky Blue (22:15)
Yeah, I often say have a friend from every decade. And I think every few years it’s good to kind of do a little check, like, okay, do I still have a friend in every decade? I think that’s wonderful. What I think you get from it is a concept that I write about called generativity. And it was developed when they did that large study of aging. I think it was from Harvard medical students that went over like 50 years or something like that. And they found that the people who were open to learning from the younger generation also were aging better. And so there is a thread there that we cannot ignore or cut or lose. And maybe back in previous generations when we had multi-generational houses and communities, that we were always probably better at that. But that I love the term of generativity. So, you know, what am I learned? It’s kind of turns that idea of what have I taught my children on its head? The idea of what have my children taught me? And that’s another great question to ask people. What have you learned from your children? And it’s a worthy discussion. Or are you trying to learn something from your children? What are your conversations exist around? Ask them hard questions. Ask them about politics or about their religion or what they’re holding deep down in their heart that they would love to do. You know, I think so often that intergenerational conversation becomes rather unserious. And I think if we can embrace and not be afraid of some of those serious conversations, we will just be blessed by this richness that will change us and improve our own view of aging.
Peter Bowes (24:04) You tell a lovely story during your TED Talk about having the best summers of your life. And you use an example, maybe you could just tell me, of someone who had his best summers during his seventies. I think we often look back at our childhoods and our time off school during a long, summer and think, well, those were the best summers and how it doesn’t necessarily have to be that way.
Becky Blue (24:30) No, and you’re referring to the example of my father-in-law. And I think it was maybe before his 70th birthday that I gave him a book about Chris craft boats. And I knew he always loved boats, but he lived up on a mountain, but he still loved boats. so he, after looking at this wooden boat book, decided he was going to build a boat. And so he sent for plans and he spent three summers up on the top of this mountain in his shop. And built a full scale replica functioning replica of a Chris craft boat. I don’t know, 20 some feet long or 30 feet. can’t remember. but just recently, and sadly he just passed this past year, but a few years ago I asked him, I guess maybe it was when I was writing the book, I said, tell me about what that meant to you those summers. And he goes, Becky, those were the best summers of my life. And. I could just cry now hearing it to think that someone at 76, 77, 78, those three summers were the best summers of his life. And what a hopeful witness to what can come at this stage of our, of our living.
Peter Bowes (25:42) Well, you just use the word that was in my mind, hope, that there’s so much potential excitement ahead. And that’s the real point of all of this, isn’t it? That we don’t know what’s coming. That as long as we put ourselves in the right place to, and I’m talking about health and vitality and physicality, put ourselves in the right place to potentially enjoy what’s to come and not see the future as closing in on us, that it’s still open in terms of potential opportunities.
Becky Blue (26:15) Yes. And what I feel or what I use a lot is the idea of posture. And I do love that we can all stand up and have good posture. That’s important for fall prevention and all of that. But I’m thinking about the posture of not turning in on ourselves. And I think that’s kind of a risk the way the aging marketplace looks right now. You know, I won’t even get into how many billions of dollars the cosmetic industry makes and all that, you know, people trying to not look their age. But to me, those are all sort of inward kinds of activities that make ourselves our own self-improvement project. And what I would rather do is tell people the posture you should assume in your third act of life is to turn out and look around. Look at what your community needs. Look at what your neighbor needs. Look at what the person sitting next to you in the coffee shop needs. And when you’re involved in those kinds of outward activities, those are the things that are going to bring you life and bring you generativity and bring and just make you an interesting person. You know, to think about, just think of the stories you’ll have to tell if rather than you’ve been, you’ve been looking in yourself all week at that, you’ve been looking out, seeing what the world needs.
Peter Bowes (27:35) So Becky, I know you enjoy travelling. What is it about life and what do you do that really invigorates you as you look to your future?
Becky Blue (27:42) That’s such an interesting question because honestly my husband and I, because of our work commitments, had a great careers of traveling a lot. so I would have to say that now I’m becoming more interested in this explorer model, but just even close to home or jumping in a car rather than jumping in an airplane. And it doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. We happen to live in a community that’s very multicultural, which probably would surprise people for being in the middle of South Dakota. But I just think that’s what gives me joy actually is meeting new people. And I think you can do that without traveling halfway across the world. If you get to do that, that’s fantastic. I’ve gotten to go to lots of countries and I absolutely love it. But we have a little camper RV van that we haven’t used for two years. And I’m like, we need to get in this and just go. know, oftentimes when I’m driving, of my things is that we can’t eat at a chain restaurant. We have to go somewhere local and we always have to pick up a local newspaper. It might cost you a dollar 50, but it’s just eye opening to find out what’s going on in these different places.
Peter Bowes (28:57) And based on the research that you did for your book and your talks, how have you, if you indeed you have, how have you changed your life in the last few years because of the new wisdom that you’ve acquired and the depth of thought that you’ve given to the aging process?
Becky Blue (29:15)
Thank you for asking that. Cause I think that was something when I started writing the book, I wasn’t expecting to be impacted by my own book, but I feel like I have been. And I think the way it’s impacted me, it’s really kept top of mind. Some of those, the things I go through in the book about keeping ourselves healthy. There’s a physical section, but also just some of those concepts about being not being fearful. I talk about that a lot. Don’t be afraid. You know, how do you, how do you get through that? And if you’re invisible, that’s maybe your own fault. How to kind of put yourself out there about confidence. And then I do talk a fair amount about faith and about having something to cling to. And I use the idea of a spirit animal, that’s my spirit animal is a mountain goat and that they can just cling to the side of a mountain even when things are getting rough. And that’s just how they’re built. And I like to think that we’re also built that way that we are built to cling and that we can cling to our faith, we can cling to each other and we can cling to those decades of experience that we have and what you would probably call wisdom. So, I try to live my book and in fact in preparation for this I listen to some of the recordings this morning of some of my chapters and I’m like, yeah, I should do that more often. This is good stuff.
Peter Bowes (30:45) And what do you say to people who might listen to this, watch this or read your book and be somewhat skeptical and say that and I will acknowledge this that we are the lucky ones that aging for some people isn’t and it’s through no fault of their own but aging isn’t always a bundle of laughs and that there can be problems that come with turning 60, 70, 80. You might lose your lifetime partner. That is going to cause you grief and immense difficulties, you could face financial problems. There are a whole gamut of issues that can hit you later in life and that it isn’t always going to be plain sailing. It isn’t always going to be fun. It isn’t always going to be that sort of blue sky approach that you and I have been talking about. So what do you say to that very real issue?
Becky Blue (31:35) Yeah, I appreciate you said that because so often I’m kind of seen as a cockeyed optimist or something like that. And I have been blessed with good health so far and all those kinds of things. I think that maybe the key is in relationships that we really need to have people around us that we can lean into, I’m a bit profaner of having a higher power to lean into, but also know that life can be rich, even if it’s just kind of where your feet are, or you know, it’s not like you have to go a long ways. I have a 98 year old aunt and I talked to her on the phone and she energizes me and she’s kind of confused to a small space right now in her life. But I think again, it’s that mindset. So even if you’re, when you’re dealing with, there’s a great book by a theologian called Marva Dawn, and the title is Being Well When (We’re) Ill. And so depending on how you define health or how you define wellness, that can happen even if you’re maybe looking at the end of your life. We just went through a hospice experience with both my father-in-law and my mother-in-law. And I have to tell you, it became a very beautiful time, a very beautiful experience. But I think at the core of all that, again, was that we were in relationship with each other. There was a trust and a piece and a hope, I guess. that’s, I don’t know. mean, I can’t, you know, I am just very positive and I don’t want to apologize for that, but I know, and that’s kind of the way the book, the book maybe reads that way to some people. But mostly I think people find that it is a book that just, they can pick up occasionally and just read and kind of give them that boost to take on another day.
Peter Bowes (33:49) Exactly. And I think that’s a huge benefit to a lot of people that, you know, it isn’t necessarily one of those books you’re going to read from cover to cover like a novel. But there are so many. There’s lots that we haven’t talked about and read the book if you want to get some more of Becky’s wisdom. But there is so much we haven’t talked about. But it is those little nuggets. It’s those little ideas that you might plant into as an idea that, well, yes, maybe I should get a few more friends who are slightly younger than me and maybe I should accept the invitation sometimes that I would decline that would open those doors to me. It’s those little, little, little lifestyle changes isn’t it that can sometimes hugely benefit and surprise us in ways that we hadn’t expected.
Becky Blue (34:34) Absolutely.
Peter Bowes (34:35) Well, look, Becky, this has been a really inspirational conversation. I just want to ask you finally, as you look to your future, you strike me as someone who will always have a to do list and something that you want to achieve around the corner. What is next on the horizon for you? Would you write into the book?
Becky Blue (34:52) Yes, I actually, I have, I’m about halfway through my next book and I had the great honor of being asked to write a memoir for a man named Ed. And so it’s looking at, his life as, in the military, but also more so he wants to tell the love story between he and his second wife, Rose. And so honestly, the concept of old love or finding love later in life is what this story is about and it fascinates me and I would like to dig into that more that whole concept of old love.
Peter Bowes (35:32) I that’s a whole new interview, a whole new episode, maybe a podcast of the future. Becky, really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us. Best of luck with all of your ventures in the show notes for this episode. I’ll put some of your details, how to get the book and the transcript of this conversation. And maybe we’ll talk again about the next book. Thank you so much.
Becky Blue (35:52) I’d look forward to that. Thank you, Peter.
The Live Long and Master Aging (LLAMA) podcast, a HealthSpan Media LLC production, shares ideas but does not offer medical advice. If you have health concerns of any kind, or you are considering adopting a new diet or exercise regime, you should consult your doctor.
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