Wherever you live, there are abundant short term choices for mini vacations. From where you live in almost any direction within 200 miles there are all kinds of adventures beckoning for your attention.

Train trips by Amtrak can occupy less than a week, flights, at reduced rates, expiring this weekend, but frequently repeated can whisk you almost anywhere and back at a reasonable cost. Pack light, plan ahead, choose a hotel deal and your adventure will be a breather you deserve.

In Arizona and New Mexico there are driving trips which take you into all sorts of enchantment. One, discovered not long ago near Tucson, is Kartchner Caverns, a pristine cave full of magnificent visual wonders. Plan a 2 or 3 day trip to take in Tombstone, Bisbee and other surrounding quaint southwestern villages.

Critical to good legal, familial, and financial planning is to have an estate plan in place. It is never too early. It is often avoided so long that it can be too late. Getting to it, either with or without legal counsel, is a very necessary step in protecting your accumulated wealth and making certain it is designated to where or whom you want it to go.

There are available Estate Planning Guides through bookstores and the Internet. As in any undertaking DO NOT allow yourself to be fleeced by someone with promises, fast talk and no skills and a quick way to take some of your money! Depending upon the value of your estate, it may be wise to engage a reputable attorney, or to use the family attorney, if you have one.

Developing an estate plan includes naming an executor, determining the viability of a trust, identifying that trust

It is forever amazing to discover how many stories are out there. Many get written, some get published, a few receive recognition. But these stories are rife with notable accounts of real experiences, revealing genuine encounters with other human beings, introducing us to characters that we wish we could know in daily existence.

I have written so much by now that some, rather audaciously, have suggested going further by penning a book, telling a real story related to my own life, opening the doors wider to a literary wonderland. Unfortunately, with all the short stories, columns, advice, attempts at forging into those undiscovered terrains, I have never had the courage to go any further.

But some day. Some kick themselves in an appropriate place to muster

Easy question! Tough to answer. Taking care of yourself is a relative issue. Some think taking care of oneself is fairly easy to accomplish. Others impose a steady, regular and somewhat strenuous set of exercises and disciplines, which are admirable, but also demanding.

No matter one’s age, such an orientation is helpful and necessary to all persons. Limits will be required, depending on physical condition and other issues. Taking care of oneself more than anything else, however, is just accepting the routine. That is the toughest consideration of all. It becomes so easy to drop the habit, get out of the routine, ignore the exercise. That is the biggest struggle to conquer in keeping yourself at the ready. Easy said…hard to do!

One of the things that is helpful is going to a physical therapist who will introduce a series of exercises which will

Among behaviors demonstrated by seniors there are many that I find myself admiring. What is difficult to comprehend, however, is how one arrives at behaviors that seem to keep attitudes at their best, health at its most vital, friendships abundant, home life content, interactions with others at a steady and enjoyable level.

Among these behaviors are:

*A calm, easy going disposition. Nothing seems to upset or detour one’s daily life into dead end despair.

*A serene spirit, which means there is a stability about one’s world view, that is not negatively influenced by day to day events that are beyond one’s control.

*A regimen of exercise which seems to keep the body functioning well and the complaints down regarding physical limitations.

Recognizing and knowing how to foil the traps of aging is critical to healthy aging. The traps of aging are often subtle, creep up on us in disguise, slip into our everyday behaviors and habits, until we have been held captive and hostage by them.

A cousin of mine, while only in the early stages of being a senior, has already begun showing signs that create discomfort for others. Still in business, ordinarily in good spirits, an attitude of negative criticism seems to be taking over. It is a sad reflection on an otherwise humorous and hale fellow well met personality. Unless there are checks and balances put in place soon, he will begin to notice people avoiding him, his business being influenced, his friends excusing themselves from his presence.

There are few goals in life more important than achieving self respect, having integrity, being admired, and being a person of truth, honor and dignity. Encouraging the development and honing these qualities helps us understand what life means.

Growing older is a series of achievements. Those achievements often grow out of bad judgments, poor decisions, lack of attention to what really is important. Every scar, each wart is an indicator of what it took for us to get through some of the tensions of growing. Those who deny any such traumas and tempests assailing our life experiences need to go through a reality check.

Tests are fairly easy to come by to determine whether our character has been helpfully molded by what we have passed through in our maturing. Its fairly easy to ascertain whether we are respected, and to be aware whether we

The post today is written by Sharon Shaw Elrod, MSW, EdD.

A lot of studies describe the relationship between behavior patterns or traits and the incidence of dementia. Such information is helpful to senior citizens in terms of understanding dementia, even though many of the studies do not draw a causal relationship. That is, the studies do not suggest behavior patterns or traits described cause dementia. They just say there is a correlation, a relationship that is yet to be fully understood.

One of those studies, published in 2008, show such a correlation. Not a cause of dementia. Just a relationship. But it’s interesting to look at.

The study was published in The American Academy of Neurology online earlier this year. The study

Because I have been busy sorting all kinds of things accumulated over the past 50 or so years, I think it timely to share just one of those pieces that I unearthed in one of the box of files the other day.

An unknown author wisely penned and some dear soul, a number of years ago, passed along the sage words I choose today. They are not mine. I wish they were. I pay tribute to this anonymous person whose own sensitivity and keen awareness knows the real value of living and keeps what is worth keeping. The author called it “Some Things You Keep.”

“”Some things you keep. Like good teeth. Warm coats. Bald husbands. They’re good for

The documentary which was so bravely done by Farrah Fawcett during her struggle with cancer was a lesson in confronting mortality with strength. It is not a pleasant experience, but it is a powerful teaching and witnessing of how it can be faced.

She was barely a senior, but all the more reason to draw from her example the way to muster the strength to go through the “valley of the shadow.” Her own gentle tenderness and stalwart courage demonstrate how to meet pain and despair and heartache and separation. She engaged life to the very end. It was not an easy passing, according to those who were nearby. But, it was one she met with the grace of someone who had dealt with her issues and faced her final curtain.

There are others many of us have known who have done so well. Death is a tough assignment, so tough that some