Keep your brain youthful and forget the older persona staring back at you when you look in a mirror. Here’s what I suggest. Bonding with friendships through dance lessons, cards, social clubs, book clubs, art classes, whatever is your passion, meet people with similar and dissimilar interests. Embrace your activities as though it is a life saver thrown to you in deep waters. Find a way to abandon your stress and greet joy. Go to shows, happy hour, smoke a bit of pot if that’s your inclination, find romance and/or simply attach yourself to people who are on the same track as you. 

Don’t be a grouchy older person, complaining about aches and pains. Attend art lectures, book readings, lectures for your own entertainment. If you wish to be more sedentary. no problem. You can watch movies with people you enjoy being with. You can have a knitting group, high-tea a couple times a week, have an artist/author come once a month to teach or read. Craft nights are terrific fun, quilting, cooking, book club, music — oh so much to do. Will it prevent dementia? Maybe not, but it can’t hurt to try.

Let’s hope you, and new and old friends, are not bound by outdated norms of age appropriate behavior. These are unwritten laws dictating proper behavior of mature women. I don’t believe in this as long as no one is hurt. Whatever background you come from you should try to deal with an unfortunate past by looking into what has brought you to this place and then zooming past those trauma, finding new paths of living. That includes making your own decisions and having your own opinions that are treated with respect by friends.

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