Your later years can be the best years of your life. An attitude of gratitude, a zest for life, a desire to keep learning and growing as you age and some spiritual comfort are all you need. Consider this blog as your gentle weekly reminder of those simple truths, dear reader. And please add your hard-won wisdom to the conversation.
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I’m Antonia Albany, and I believe it’s never too late to savor life more deeply, start something new or even reinvent yourself.
That’s why, in my 60’s, I decided to reinvigorate a life-long passion of mine: writing. I started blogging over seven years ago and have written three books on the subject of aging gratefully.
Like you, I’ve had an interesting life — filled with good times and bad, joys and tragedies, abundance and scarcity, successes and failures.
I’ve seen a lot of the world. I was a military kid, and we lived all over — in Japan, France, Illinois, Texas, Virginia, Nevada and California. (My father was in the Ziegfeld Follies before he joined the Army Air Corps.)
I’ve been self-sufficient most of my life. I started out as a secretary. After I put myself through college, I was in management in the wine, real estate and banking industries, worked in law enforcement (computerizing Sonoma County’s 9-1-1 system) and at a jail (happily running education programs for prisoners).
I’m a breast cancer survivor, once actually lived in a glass house, have buried both parents, my older sister and a husband, and now live in Northern California with my very shy three-legged cat, Kali.
When I’m not writing, you’ll find me reading on a wide range of topics (I have four library books on my night table right now), spending time with friends, cooking, knitting, coloring, and watching inspiring documentaries.
Like many of us, I’ve struggled with feelings of not being enough. Realizing in my 50’s that I had an emptiness inside led me to join a local spiritual community. I go there to be reminded of the basics – that I live in a loving universe and am perfectly imperfect and more than enough.
Knowing this gives me great comfort. It’s also why I write.
Writing helps remind me of the basic truths that keep me joyful. It’s an outlet for my burning desire to know more and be more. Tackling topics like gratitude and forgiveness helps me understand them at a much deeper level.
Writing is also creating my legacy, as I never had children. In addition to my books on aging, to date, I’ve been published in The Potato Soup Journal, SeniorPlanet.org, The Sonoma County Update, Tiny Lights, HushedHeartache.com, West Marin Review, 50 Word Stories of 2021, and Oprah Magazine.
I see so many unhappy seniors who focus mostly on the inevitable losses of aging. I want to remind them you don’t need lots of money, the youthful body you once had or even a partner to derive great joy and meaning from life. The idea that something I write might help someone change their life for the better today, or decades after I’m gone, gives me great pleasure.
I hope you’ll share this blog with your friends, comment on blog posts that interest you and sign up for my newsletter.
If you have a suggestion for a topic you’d like me to write about email me at Antonia.Albany@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you!