What do male boomer do when they get old?
Those born in the baby boomer generation are entering the longest phase of elderhood in history, full of potential but also fraught with challenges My friend Jeremy’s father has always taken pride in doing things himself. When Jeremy (whose name I have changed for his privacy) was a kid, he watched his dad, an architect, painstakingly renovate their entire family home – ripping up floorboards and laying tile. Today, Jeremy’s dad still insists on climbing up a ladder to clean out the gutters; he wants to fell deadwood with a pruning saw and move heavy furniture around the basement. But now 80 and living with Parkinson’s disease, his drive comes with higher stakes, every strenuous task increasing his risk of preventable harm. “My dad doesn’t know anything else,” Jeremy says. “He’s always been the person who fixes the hole in the roof.” Now he does it in spite of family members desperately trying to convince him to let them do it instead or pass those responsibilities to hired help. Being...