Mid Atlantic Cohousing

How to make a gingerbread house in 2 minutes and 49 seconds!
Winslow Cohousing, Bainbridge Island, WA

You can leave comments here.  While here, cruise around earlier blog posts and other parts of the website.  Look for FREE downloads!  Subscribe!  

If you received this newsletter from a third party ... you can subscribe yourself!  We don't trade names, we don't spam and we're all around lovely people!

Old age, another final frontier:  and just like deep space, it is dark and unknown. 

In the last few decades I have watched my grandparents, aunts, mother in law, a few peers, and dozens of hospice patients age and die.  I've always had friends who are much older, and in our talks over the years they share what getting older feels like, their various physical challenges, and how they are thinking about the end of life.  Some cope with humor, some with different flavors of denial, some with an interesting assortment of approach and avoidance.  I had been working in the well-being field, and when I applied well-being concepts to my interest in aging, I landed in cohousing. 

A cohousing community could be a perfect forum for support and exploration during aging. Through a great convergence of interests and opportunities, I am now a (much older than usual) student in a graduate program in Applied Gerontology, studying with a major senior cohousing researcher. 
 
I have been thinking a lot about aging lately, especially the really old years.  In Gerontology class we discuss three stages of old age: 

• young-old,  about ages 55-65 (even called “late middle age”  or “go-go” by some);
• middle-old, about ages 65-75 or 80 (or “slow-go”); and
• old-old, ages above 80 or 85 until death (or “no-go”.) 

In our youth-obsessed culture, the old-old years are often collapsed into stereotypes of physical ailments, meaninglessness and irrelevance, and there seems to be little about it that is appealing.  In the interest of full disclosure, some aspects of old-old age are difficult, physically and emotionally:  people important to you die, you are not able to do as much as you used to, and your body is deteriorating.  Still, when approached with acceptance and curiosity, the last part of life can be as rich and rewarding as the earlier years, in a different way. 

I now propose the term “Deep Aging” (TM) to describe the period of life between the beginning of old-old age and death.  Deep Aging (TM) implies depth, exploration, meaning, insight, courage and subtlety, none of which is guaranteed simply by the passage of years.  It conveys a life task to age deeply and meaningfully, and challenges us to pay attention and plumb its depths.
 
My biology professor spent an entire course describing “normal age-related changes” in physical functioning.  By age 80, the average person will have a reduction in maximal breathing capacity of about 55%.  We will experience about a 40% reduction in kidney function.  Our mitochondria (you remember from high school biology, the “powerhouse of the cell,”) will have reduced by 15%, meaning the body simply produces less energy.  Collagen will degrade over time, resulting in increased stiffness.  Cartilage thins, muscle mass and bone mass decrease. 

All of these are normal age-related changes.  There are always outliers:  the 90 year old who swims the English Channel, the 82 year old ballerina, the 85 year old who runs competitively.  But most of us experience normal age-related changes right on schedule.  An optimal diet, optimal exercise, optimal genes, optimal environment and optimal lifestyle are beneficial for a whole host of reasons.  But aging will still occur, if you are lucky enough to live into your older years, and eventually you will die.
 
And death?  Ninety percent (90%) us will die from a predictable chronic illness such as heart disease, cancer, organ failure, or dementia.  These deaths take time, maybe years, and the effects of illness are on top of the normal age-related changes that are also underway.  So, exceptional as we all want to be, there is a good chance that we will need a plan for managing our old-old years, with or without chronic illness. 
 
Now for the good news:  in cohousing, experiencing this life stage together with peers creates conditions to magnify the richness of aging, especially in the very advanced years.  Even in cohousing people say “I'm not old!” or think because they have a co-care agreement with neighbors that they will be protected from the perils of aging.  We have seen cohousers die at home as they intended, but other long-term cohousers leave the community to move to assisted living or a nursing home because their needs exceeded what they were able to manage, for different reasons. 

We have an opportunity in cohousing to explore Deep Aging (TM) with the courage and innovation that brought us to cohousing in the first place, and make our communities liveable into our old-old years.  Some communities are actively discussing end of life issues, and some are finding ways to make their intergenerational community more age-friendly.  With openness and creative thinking, cohousers can figure out how to make aging in place in community a reality for our members. 

In the next few weeks, cohousers interested in tackling the issues around Deep Aging (TM), aging in place in community and all the attendant co-care issues will begin a national conversation to address these challenges.   For more information contact:  Ann Zabaldo.

​Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing

FOR A LARGE TURKEY, THE NIGHT BEFORE

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Wash and stuff  the turkey. Coat surface with oil or butter or nothing. I cook the turkey on top of a bed of stuffing in a large enough pan. If you want to make gravy, cook the additional stuffing separately so you can save the drippings.

I use Pepperidge Farm Herb Dressing and add onions, butter, and sometimes cranberries or celery. You can add anything you like. You can also make your own stuffing, of course, but why duplicate the masters?

Cook the turkey at 300 for one hour to kill surface bacteria and seal the surface.

Turn the temperature down to 165, the “done” temperature for turkey. This is the key to slow cooking. The dish will never be over-cooked. All flavors and texture will be unharmed.

Cook 1 hour for each pound. Watch the oven temperature—many ovens have difficulty maintaining low temperatures. Crack the door if it gets too hot. The oven may only turn on for a few minutes every hour or so.

Use a meat thermometer to ensure that the turkey is done. (The pop-up button that ensures that a turkey is done may over cook or undercook a turkey using this method — or any method, actually.

SOME OVENS TURN THEMSELVES OFF AT ~12 HOURS, so may have to reset them.

Only the turkey is fail-safe. I can’t control your oven.

NEXT-DAY TURKEY SOUP

DAY ONE

After dinner: Do not let people take all the left-over meat and dressing. (You may need help. Weapons are usually not necessary.)

Save the dressing aside so people can put it in their soup or eat as a side dish.

Put all bones, skin, etc., in a large pot and add water to cover. If some bones are sticking up, just push them down periodically while cooking until they stay down. Add 1-3 tablespoons of vinegar depending on the size of the pot to leech calcium out of the bones. The vinegar will cook off so no taste will remain or what does will blend with other flavors.

Put onions, parsley, celery, etc. in with the bones. You can cut them into large pieces, just small enough to fit in the pan.

Strong simmer until the  connecting tissue is soft and the bones just begin to fall away — about 4 hours or so.

Put the whole pot with the bones and vegetables in the fridge or if it is cold enough, outdoors. Put  a stone on the cover outside if you have raccoons or large cats. Leave it for 12-24 hours to leech more calcium out of the bones and allow the flavors to blend.

DAY TWO: 

Scoop off the big globs of fat on the top. You don’t have to be meticulous about this. You want plenty left for taste and nourishment. Remember, this is a one pot fills all meal.

Warm the pot so the soup stock is completely melted.  Cool until safe to handle and pour the soup through a colander into another pot.  With the solids now in the colander, pick out the loose pieces of meat and any remaining on the bones.

Mush the meat carefully by hand to be sure there are no small bones.

Set the meat aside and throw out all the solids. The vegetables will be cooked to a mush of tasteless fiber but don’t cry over them. All the taste and minerals stay in the broth.

If you want to remove more fat, you can put the pot of liquid back in the fridge so it floats to the top and becomes solid. Or use a baster to siphon it off. But remember, a lot of the flavor is in the fat. Don’t over do it.

Boil the liquid down until it has a rich taste, usually reducing it by 1/4 to 1/3. This depends on how much water you used on Day One.

Hearten up. The soup is almost done. Season and add whatever else you want in the soup — carrots, celery, beans, rice, noodles, etc. — and cook until they are done. Add left over turkey just in time to heat it thoroughly.

Heat dressing separately if desired. (I like cold stuffing.)

I use soy sauce instead of salt because it gives a richer color. Soup stock can be really ugly and I’ve never been successful in the clarifying techniques recommended in cookbooks. (You probably lose flavor anyway when you swirl eggs around in it.)

I like Old Bay for poultry. Then I just smell stuff on the spice rack and decide if I want it or not. Sage is good in turkey soup. Some butter gives a nice aftertaste. It doesn’t have to be a lot. A very small amount adds flavor.

Fail-Safe Slow Cooking Turkey sounds like a lot of work but it isn’t. Most of the time things are just cooking by themselves.

Sharon Villines
Fail-Safe Slow Cooking Turkey & Next Day Soup
Takoma Village Cohousing
TakomaVillage.org
Washington DC
202-722-1727
sharon@sharonvillines.com

Recipe posted online at: 

http://www.sharonvillines.com/fail-safe-slow-cooking-turkey-and-turkey-soup/

You can download all the recipes from Thanksgiving AND Sharon's wonderful Fail-Safe recipe for cooking a holiday turkey right from our website!

​Wanna have a contest?  What fun contests about "life in cohousing" would you like to see?  Send your suggestions to:  Ann Zabaldo.  Or you can comment on our blog.  Open to all clean & green, natural, organic, cage & steroid-free contests ...

You can leave comments below.  We welcome them!   Cruise around earlier blog posts and other parts of the website.  Look for FREE downloads! Subscribe!  

Subscribe to our newsletter! ! We don't trade names, we don't spam and we're all around lovely people!  Just go to our HOME PAGE and sign up by clicking the button in the middle of the page!

​Thirty-five people attended the recent tour of Takoma Village Cohousing on Sunday, December 6, 2015.  Special guest, Alice Alexander, Ex., Director of CohoUS spoke briefly at the tour.  Takoma Village conducts these public tours four times a year to educate the public about cohousing and to maintain a healthy pool of prospective buyers for resales.
_________________________________________________________________________________________

Speaking of the very dynamic Alice Alexander mentioned above ... after the tour she met with 23
members of Mid Atlantic Cohousing in a "white gloves off" session to discuss the challenges facing cohousing communities as members are aging.  What became clear at the meeting is that little has been done either in intergenerational cohousing or even Senior cohousing to address the period of time between "healthy aging" and death.  This is the life stage in which "activities of daily living" or ADLs become paramount.  These may include feeding, dressing, toileting, bathing, etc.  Nancy Francis, a graduate student at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, identifies this stage and the time approaching this stage "deep aging."  Currently, in almost all cohousing communities when members approach this stage they must find other support including moving to assisted living or nursing care.

To address the issues surrounding "deep aging", Mid Atlantic Cohousing is organizing a working group of MAC members to study the issues and to begin formulating a cohousing response to keeping our elders in the community throughout the life span.   MAC will work with gerontology expert, Janice Blanchard, to identify issues in late life aging as well as begin constructing the framework of a model that can be used by cohousers and others to tackle the issues.  Janice has been at the forefront of gerontologists looking at aging and community.   MAC is delighted to be working with this expert with a 30,000 ft view as well as the ground level experience. This working group will  then attend the upcoming Aging Better in Community conference being co-sponsored by SageHill Cohousing and CohoUS.  Together with others attending the conference MAC believes conference attendees can design and take away a process for initiating a program for their respective communities.  For more information please contact Ann Zabaldo 202.546.4654  ann.zabaldo@gmail.com.
_________________________________________________________________________________________

Mid Atlantic Cohousing is announcing another 2-year intensive Facilitator Training Program with Laird Schaub. The program will start in the Fall of 2016.   MAC initiated this facilitation training series for Laird which, after a very successful completion in our region, he replicated in many other parts of the U.S.   More than 10 MAC members  participated in the original training program -- many of them are still facilitating and training others in their respective cohousing community.  We'll post details as soon as they become available.
_________________________________________________________________________________________

Still time to cut your own tree before Christmas!  Hundredfold Farm (Orrtanna, Pennsylvania) is one of the few cohousing communities which has a community owned and operated business:  a Christmas tree farm.  And as it's the season ... at  Seven Springs Tree Farm you can cut your own tree on Fridays (10a-6 p) and Saturdays and Sundays (8a-6p). Heads up:  The Farm will be closed on Christmas Eve.  After you've lassoed and tied down your tree atop your car stop by their neighbors at  Halbrendt Vineyard and Winery.
_________________________________________________________________________________________
Heathcote Community (Freehand, MD) has scheduled a Visitor Day for Saturday, February 20, 2016.  Come have FUN and learn about this innovative community just outside Baltimore, Maryland.

Just because it's the holidays ... it's chocolate ... and it's FLAT PACKED no less ...

You can leave comments below.  Cruise around earlier blog posts and other parts of the website.  Look for FREE downloads!  Subscribe!  
​
If you received this newsletter from a third party ... you can subscribe yourself! We don't trade names, we don't spam and we're all around lovely people!

Every morning, all across America people peer into bathroom mirrors searching for signs of age.  No line, no blemish is overlooked.  We dread the appearance of those little lines at the corner of our mouths and eyes and then we console ourselves with the thought that, really, they are hardly noticeable.  Still we know the truth.  We are getting older -- every day one day older.  
William H. Thomas, M.D.
What Are Old People For?

What are old people for?  What ARE they for?

When I started my cohousing journey waaay back in 1991,  I was 41 years old. Three months before I turned 50, I moved into my cohousing community, Takoma Village Cohousing in Washington, DC — the same year I got my first invitation to join AARP.

Just this past November Takoma Village celebrated its 15th year living in our cohousing neighborhood.  
Now, I’m 65, a card carrying Medicare user Parts A&B, and an AARP Part D insurance plan subscriber.  I would tell you my hair is grayer but only my hairdresser knows that for sure.

We are all getting older.  A veritable tsunami of Americans are turning 65.

• Where will we all live?  
• What are our options?  
• Will we choose a Sun City “active adult” community living there until we can’t act anymore?  And then where do we go?
• Can we afford a Continuing Care Retirement Community? 
• Will we live our last years in assisted living?  In a nursing home?
• For those of us already in cohousing … has our community grappled with the needs of elders no longer able to take care of themselves?  Are we expected to move out?  
• Ditto for those of us in Senior Cohousing?  What are the plans for the community to help its members stay in the community?  
• Will our intergenerational communities become NORCs  (Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities)?  The kids have grown up and moved away and only older folks are moving in?
• Where are we headed as we head toward old age?
• In the end — literally and figuratively — is there a place for me in cohousing?

These are just a very few of the questions you can explore at the upcoming Aging Better Together - The Power of Community conference co-sponsored by SageHill Cohousing and CohoUS May 20-21, 2016 in Salt Lake City, Utah.

In addition to some of the heavier and headier questions about aging in cohousing we will also celebrate the joys and contributions of being a senior living in or planning to live in community.  As a group:

• We are wiser
• We are bolder
• We are not weighed down by career or raising a family
• We have time and energy to contribute
• We are definitely funnier because you can’t get older without a sense of humor

I am on the planning team for the conference.  I invite you to share your thoughts about aging in community, what you would like to see addressed at the conference, what’s happening in your community.  You can leave your comments at the bottom of this blog post on our website.  Or, you can write me directly:  Ann.Zabaldo@gmail.com
​
And … I invite you to attend this conference.  It promises to be the first of many to come.  Be a pioneer.  Be there!

​Hundredfold Farm (Orrtanna, Pennsylvania) is one of the few cohousing communities which has a community owned and operated business:  a Christmas tree farm.  And as it's the season ... at  Seven Springs Tree Farm you can cut your own tree on Fridays (10a-6 p) and Saturdays and Sundays (8a-6p). Heads up:  The Farm will be closed on Christmas Eve.  After you've lassoed and tied down your tree atop your car stop by their neighbors at  Halbrendt Vineyard and Winery.

Heathcote Community (Freeland, MD) has scheduled a Visitor Day for Saturday, February 20, 2016.  Come have FUN and learn about this innovative community just outside Baltimore, Maryland.

If you received this newsletter from a third party ... you can subscribe yourself!   Look for FREE downloads just for signing up!  We don't trade names, we don't spam and we're all around lovely people!