Still Clickin

If you’re reading this, you already know about the Internet. The use of the Internet by the senior community is continually expanding. And it doesn’t have to cost you anything. At local libraries, computers are siting there waiting for your curiosity and fingertips.

What do seniors do with the Internet when their fingertips start moving? According to a report by the Pew Research Center, they are involved with -

*Email - This still drives their primary usage of the Internet. Keeping in touch without the hassle of time zones and time charges, email remains the primary reason why people keep going back to the Internet. It’s especially delightful when the message is from your grandchildren. Free email accounts can be established at Yahoo and other services.

*Finding Information - Once they finish with their email, people typically switch to Google or Yahoo to find out about something. They might be planning a trip, researching a problem, or comparing different brands of toasters. Not surprisingly, Most Internet searches on health topics are performed by seniors.

*Online Shopping - Once they have completed their research, seniors are not afraid to actually make a purchase. As noted in the Pew Report, nearly 50% of the online seniors actually are making purchases. One area of particular interest is travel, both planning and booking tickets. They also are not afraid to both sell and buy items on eBay.

In addition to these top three activities, seniors also explore other facets.

*Reading News - If they’ve moved away, seniors are very likely to scan the pages of the old hometown newspaper online. They are also avid readers of specialized news topics on politics, entertainment, and other targeted sectors. Even the headlines of major newspapers, e.g. New York Times, are available online.

*Sharing Photos - Whether directly through email or via a service like Flickr, seniors love to see the latest images of their grandchildren, grandnieces, and grandnephews.

*Skype - If you are geographically removed from loved ones, skype is a treasure for everyone regardless of age. Simply speaking, skype not only allows you to talk to those you love, but to see and interact with them from many miles away. The visuals of loved ones make them feel so much closer, and it can ease the worries and loneliness that distance can engender.

*Social Sharing - Seniors have not flocked to Facebook or Twitter. They might view a My Space or You Tube link contained in an email, but they are not going to enroll. At this point in their lives, seniors are far less intrigued by the social and gaming aspects of the Internet than are the younger members of our society. Instant messaging holds as little appeal as instant gratification. They prefer to respect privacy and to savor the anticipation of a thoughtful reply. They find important items more interesting than urgent ones.

*Blogs - Because seniors have the time, there are a surprising number of blogs by, for, and about seniors. They are quite often frank, intelligent, and very thought-provoking. They can not only make for fascinating reading, but they can often make you chuckle, cry, and pray. One huge favorite blog that publishes links to many others is Ronni Bennett’s Time Goes By A visit to Ronni’s site is always worthwhile.

The Internet presents all of these facilities and more. It has become an indispensable part of our lives. You should encourage any of your friends that are not involved to take a free course at the library. They may feel uncomfortable at first, but they will thank you profusely later.

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If you are delving into your genealogy, one of the treasure’s you can explore is the local lore of family memories. I wish I had done a much better job of that when I was younger. I could have learned a lot. Now, I’m part of that older generation, and its time for me to recapture memories of our family’s shared past. For example, remembering the first visits to my father’s family when I was young.

I never met his dad, my grandfather. He died nearly a decade before my birth. But I do remember many trips to see Grandma. My Dad would go more often, but the whole family went practically every summer.

I remember one trip during the early years of WWII. The five of us were packed into the old, black Dodge, and my Mother was worried that the car wouldn’t make it. But we cruised along up through the Pocono Mountains, and as we crested one hill, we could see the city of Wilkes-Barre spread out below us. It hugged the shore of the Susquehanna River

Grandma’s house was located at the top of a hill on a side street to a main shopping street. The houses lined the street, but all of the garages were situated on a separate alley behind the row of homes. They were probably first built for carriages, rather than cars, and sited to provide a bit of separation. Her house was surrounded by a wrought iron fence, and we could safely run around in the yard.

As you entered her front door, there was a pallor to the right. This room had the nice furniture and lace curtains, and you weren’t allowed to play in there. Walking back further into the house, there was a dining room on the right and a big kitchen in the back. The heart of the kitchen was a big, cast iron stove. It was heated by coal, and every morning Grandma would get up stoke the fire and add more coal to heat it up again for the next day. Wilkes-Barre sat in the heart of the anthracite coal region, and many people in the family and the region worked for the mines. Everyone used coal.

The smells from the kitchen were wonderful, and Grandma fed us and fed us. Sometimes she would use funny words when she talked. My mother told us that she learned those words in the “old country”. When we asked what she meant, Grandma would laugh and tell us what the words meant in English.

One day, our cousins, Jeannie, Annie, and Carole came over to visit. Annie was near my age, and she was nice. We all had our picture taken with Grandma on the front porch.

Aunt Margaret and Uncle Pat lived with Grandma. Uncle Joe was much younger than my father, and he would go out and play ball with us in the yard. During our visit, we went to a park and played in the cool water of Bear Creek. Uncle Joe was with us, and he tried to teach me how to swim. When I hesitated, he threw me into the middle of the creek and told me that I had to “sink or swim”. I swam the doggy paddle back to shore, and he was enormously proud. I’ve always loved swimming ever since.

After dinner, we would read or listen to the radio. The men would sit around the dining room table, play cards, and drink some Stegmaier Beer. The Stegmaier Brewery was located down at the bottom of the hill, and you could often smell the pervasive aroma of the hops. When no one was looking, Uncle Joe gave me a small juice glass of Stegmaier Beer. I drank it all down, but my father yelled at him and said I was too young. Uncle Joe loved to get us into trouble.

After church on Sunday, we went out the back gate, across and down the alley to visit the O’Donnell’s. Patrick was Grandma’s brother. He, and his wife Mary and daughter Kathleen laughed a lot and told us stories. They were very nice to us and served us the most cold, delicious root beer. Patrick and Grandma talked a lot to each other using the funny words, and said that was the language they used when they were our age. Uncle Patrick had to leave after a while to tend to the pub that he owned.

The next day, my father brought me to see Uncle Patrick at his pub. The men sat and sipped their beer while I had more of that cold root beer. After that, my Dad and I walked a few blocks over to see the house where he grew up. It was a nice house, but not as big as where Grandma is now and not as close to Uncle Patrick.

We had a great time at Grandma’s, and I remember being so sorry that we couldn’t go the following year because our gasoline rationing sticker wouldn’t allow us enough gas to make it. But we did make it the next year and many, many more.

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It seems like five minutes ago that digital photography was the new, expensive kid on the block. Now, digital is mainstream and film photography is becoming the oddity. As for cost, $10 bought me a small digital camera for my grandchildren six months ago, and incredibly, it is still working.

Digital cameras have matured. No longer do manufacturers promote MP, i.e. megapixels, as the be all and end all of quality. They have grown beyond that superficial measure, as noted by the press. Reasonable cameras now are available at a wide range of prices, and their operation has become simpler. There are cameras that anyone can operate.

There are a number of very good digital cameras that you can truly point-and-shoot. The biggest negative difference from film cameras is that there is a slight shutter delay of a second or two between pointing and shooting. The biggest positive difference is that you can see your picture right away and delete anything you don’t like. Overall, you travel home with better pictures of treasured memories.

Finding your camera might require a little research, but there is a lot of information waiting for you. For example,

• The Camera Buying Guide by Consumer Reports is a good place to start.
• CNET provides a wide number of reviews on individual cameras, including the point-and-shoot variety.
• DP Review is more for the hard core enthusiast, but their tracking of the best sellers and individual camera reviews can help prevent surprises.
• Steve’s Site also has helpful reviews of specific cameras.

After you do your research, go to the store and feel them in your hand. You may find that a highly rated camera is uncomfortable for you to hold or too bulky for you to carry. You’ll definitely miss the shot if the camera is home in the drawer.

Once you have your camera, you have more choices for your memories than you once did.

1. If you are adverse to computers, you can bring your chip to any number of drug and discount stores for printing, just like in the old days. There are no negatives, but you can still store your photos in the albums or shoe boxes you prefer.
2. If you do use computers and email, you can immediately share the photos by -

• directly attaching them to emails, or
• posting them to one of the many photo sharing sites like Flickr, which is free, or Kodak Gallery which charges a fee.

Once you have had a lot of fun using the camera for a few months, go back and read over the directions once again. You’ll be surprised at all the features it offers. I’ve done that review a few times, and I’m still learning. It may be a bit of a challenge, but the memories you capture are more than ample reward.

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Soon, we are scheduled to take a trip to the land of my ancestors. In addition, some of the members of my family’s next generation have been asking for any hints about their lineage. They have even uncovered and shown me some information that I had never seen. With all of those prods, I finally started to turn back some pages on our family’s history, and I am surprised at how much I am discovering.

A lot of the information still sits on handwritten records in some musty archive. But that being said, there is still an incredible amount that is available online. What I have discovered so far -

• A great grandfather and a photo of himself to boot.
• A great aunt and uncle whom I had never heard about.
• Dates, facts, and specifics on one side of the family that are supported by written records.
• A challenge to uncover more about the other side of the family.

Most American families came from “somewhere else”. We’re immigrants. Whether for political, social, or economic reasons, someone in our personal lineage had the courage to say, “Let’s move.” I can only guess at how heart-wrenching it must have been to leave family, friends, and the familiar and strike out for a new country. Our ancestors were very brave people.

To discover the stories of these people. To learn how many died in their thirties while others endured into their nineties. To scrape some distant recollections from the memories of your early youth. To discover ancestral photos, that you’ve never seen, revealed by distant cousins, that you never knew existed. These are the delights that make the tedious research of genealogy all worth it.

Your approach may be different, but I -

• started with the ship manifests at Ellis Island
• switched to Google using both names of various spellings as well as dates and addresses that I unveiled.
• followed these searches to government records, generally census records, which may be digitized or simply scanned and organized by geography rather than name.
• also followed these searches to the postings made by other people whose search may overlap with my own.

At this point, you are finished with most of the freebies. There are a lot of sites out there that are all too willing to help . . . for a price. You have to filter these to see if any are worth it for your search, but I’m considering -

• Ancestry.com which has the decency to offer a 14-day free trial. This site seems to offer the most complete facilities and have the longest reach.
• Government Genealogy Search which says its free, but their hand is out. They search multiple government databases.
• One Great Family gives a seven-day free trial.

This is the type of search that never really ends, but I now encourage others to try.
You really might enjoy the challenge . . . and expect everyone in the family to want a copy!

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If you want to experience an upbeat moment, see the documentary, Young@Heart. This is the story of a group of senior citizens from Northampton, MA who belong to a chorus that knocks your socks off.

Rather than sing songs from Gershwin or Cohen, this crew serves up renditions of Coldplay, the Clash and Jimi Hendrix. They don’t just sing at the local auditorium, but internationally. Audiences love both their talent and their spunk. See the details at their own website, Young@Heart Chorus. Whether you purchase a copy of their movie there or order it through Netflix, you will be cheered and amazed by the quality of their performance.

Oh, it should also be mentioned that the average age of the group is 81. Just the way that Eileen Hall, age 92, serves up “Should I Stay or Should I Go” by the Clash will make you sit up and take notice. See this film and be inspired by the determination, enthusiasm, camaraderie, and real talent of this ensemble.

Your town may not have a group like this, but it certainly must have church choirs as well as other groups that embrace the wonder of song. Rather than waste your talent on arias in the shower, investigate what’s happening in your area. Song is a universal gift. If you are searching for an activity that benefits both body and soul, try the chorus.

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