After forty, life is just beginning. A new life in retirement

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

Four stories that prove that you can find inspiration, vocation and love in adulthood and remain active as in youth.

I never saw myself as a grandmother on a bench

Rimma Nekrasova, 65 years old

Before retirement, I worked at the Institute of Cybernetics under the Ministry of Agriculture, was engaged in public work. After the collapse of the USSR, my husband and I went into trade, we kept our own shop. In 2014, we closed the business and retired. All my life I was an active person and I never saw myself as a grandmother on the bench. After retirement, a vacuum formed around me, and I began to look for where to stick myself. I went to the social service center and began to go on excursions, participate in master classes, take pictures, and met new people. Soon I was invited to the Council of Veterans of the Academic District of Moscow, and for three years now I have been the chairman of the organizational methodological commission.

Then my friend from the Council of Veterans told that she was engaged in volunteering. I also decided to try. Now I am a silver volunteer, my eldest granddaughter also introduced my husband to volunteering. We worked at very different events: at the Moscow Urban Forum, the FIFA World Cup, at the night race, we went with culinary master classes to a boarding school for people with disabilities. Now I am a volunteer at the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. And last year I was made the face of the Moscow Longevity advertising campaign. In general, you don't get bored.

Volunteering awakens interest in life, gives you the opportunity to see new places, meet people, keeps you in good shape. When I worked, I was not up to myself: children and my husband raised, then grandchildren, looked after sick parents. And now I can do what I am interested in, and volunteering is a great help in this. It made me more attentive and benevolent, I began to look at people differently. One late evening, returning from a regular event, I saw a drunk man leave the store and fell into a snowdrift. It was very cold outside, he would have simply died. Perhaps earlier I would have passed by, but now I'm a volunteer! I tried to pick him up, called passers-by for help, we found a janitor who recognized this man and took him home. It all ended well.

Although my life was not easy, I have always looked and look at it with optimism. I believe that there are more good people than bad people: in difficult times, someone always helped me. Regarding some problems, I have always been indifferent, and if something bad happened, I did not think that life was over. Close to my heart, I only accept the health problems of loved ones, everything else is a matter of everyday life.

I became a newlywed at 65

Valery Pashinin, 65 years old

I am a technician by training and have been working as the technical director of a road company for the last 15 years. My day is scheduled by the hour, I am constantly on the move. Despite the fact that I hold a managerial position, I work a lot with my hands: I am engaged in the repair of Russian and foreign technical installations, which few people know how to set up, I train specialists. And in my free time I repair antique watches and sewing machines, distribute some of them, and leave some for my collection. I will open an exhibition someday. In general, I like to work with my hands, my friends even call me Samodelkin or Kulibin.

Another hobby of mine is dancing. In my youth, of course, I went to dance floors, but I could not dance beautifully and correctly, and I always wanted to learn how to dance the waltz. A little less than a year ago, I learned about the Moscow Longevity program, which made it possible to learn ballroom dancing. Well, I went. In the studios, people were periodically selected to participate in shows, shows, parties, photo shoots and fashion shows. I went through one of the auditions and in December at the rehearsal of the theatrical show I met Galya. The director said that the fashion show needed a married couple. He brought me to the center: “Here you will be a husband. Who will be the wife? " Galya blurted out: "Me!" - and immediately stood next to me, pressed against me. This is how our romance began.

Galya is ten years younger than me, she was alone for a long time, she raised three children. My wife died four years ago. Thoughts about marriage slipped through my mind, but somehow no one clung to me. There were many women at dances and auditions who wanted to meet me, but Galya flashed like a moth - and I disappeared. We joked that we might indeed become husband and wife. After the rehearsal, we exchanged phones and began to communicate. The Old New Year was already celebrated together, one might say that it was our first date. We never parted again. And a few months later I proposed to her. Gali asked her sons and daughter's hands for hands. The children were very surprised, but took the news well. Galya, of course, was also surprised, but I felt that she was waiting for this proposal. On July 6, we played a wedding - noisy and fun. After the registry office, fifty students of Gali staged a dance flash mob in wedding dresses, which can get into the Guinness Book of Records.

Galya is very open, cheerful, mobile. She has been teaching Zumba for several years and has up to nine groups a day. I see how she turns people on - it's just fantastic. We have many common interests, we do not want to part: we dance together, cook, dig in the garden - and it doesn’t get boring. We are constantly on the move and do not feel our age. Youth is in the head.

“I started painting to escape depression after the death of my husband”

Nelly Peskina, 91

I worked as a biology teacher at school for 40 years. My profession was my life. After retirement, I graduated from gardening courses, and my husband and I dug in the garden and raised our grandchildren.

In 2011, my husband died. We lived together for 63 years, and for me his death was a heavy blow. I understood that I needed to go out to people, communicate, otherwise I would just go crazy. Once on the street I saw an ad for an art studio: "We'll teach you how to draw in an hour." I have always loved painting, often went to museums, read books on art, but I didn’t even take a pencil in my hands - I wasn’t up to that: the family was big, grandchildren had to be brought up. So at 84 I started painting. I ran away from depression in the studio. She barely went to class, and flew back on wings, carrying her own oil painting in her hands. This went on for a year, then the studio had to be abandoned: the classes were paid and, frankly, very expensive.

I didn't want to give up painting. It turned out that at our social service center - in the Moscow Longevity program - there is also a studio, and classes there are free. I've been painting here for six years now. I especially love landscapes and still lifes. Over time, due to vision problems, it became more difficult for me to mix colors and choose the right tone, so I switched to graphics. I draw and forget about my sores.

Last year, my personal exhibition took place in our center, and after that my work and the work of other students of the studio were exhibited in the Manege and the Lenin Library.

“I came to the gym at 87”

Evgeniya Petrovskaya, 90 years old

When I was young, I was actively involved in sports. A year and a half after the end of the Great Patriotic War, my father brought me a motorbike from Germany, we learned to ride it together. So at the time I entered the Moscow Institute of Physical Culture, I already had a motorcycle license. A former racer was in charge of the institute's garage. There were also motorcycles in the garage, and on weekends we students went to trainings. The girls in the dorm turned up their noses, because I always smelled of gasoline. Since I had rights, they began to put me up for competitions. Besides motorsport, I also played basketball. My height is only 157 centimeters, but at that time it did not bother anyone, teams were collected from short ones. We even took part in the Moscow basketball championship.

After graduating from university, I got a job at a book publishing house. Once motorcycle racer Evgeny Gringout came to us, and I complained to him that I had abandoned the motorcycle. He invited me to join Trudovye Rezervy (Trudovye Rezervy), and subsequently I took part in the USSR championship for six years in a row.

With age, sports in my life became less and less. I worked as an editor all my life, then I retired. Three years ago I fell off the stool and hurt myself badly. Fortunately, there were no fractures, but the pain was severe. The doctor prescribed painkillers for me, but because of these pills, my coordination of movements was disturbed. That is, I cannot take the medicine, but I have to get up on my feet. What to do? After consulting a doctor, I decided to do physical education. I came from the gym next to the house, I say: "I will either collapse or strengthen myself." And now every day for three years I have been going there to study. At first, the classes were paid, then for the pensioners of "Moscow Longevity" they were given free of charge. She also introduced her friend Sveta, who needed to recover from the operation, to sports. She is 18 years younger than me, easier for her. Sometimes she helps me. The people there are friendly, protect and take care of us. If not for physical education, I would not have been in this world. And you would only know what strong and beautiful legs I have become!