AofA's Hot To Trot Talking Points
Every Friday
So this week
and I are wishing you all a happy festive time whatever that looks like to you. We’re aware that for lots of people, it’s a challenging time and we welcome people’s different ideas for celebrating Xmas. I am also previewing the interview and walk I did with legendary musician, Neneh Cherry which will go live here on Substack next Tuesday, Xmas Eve.
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and I would like to wish you all a nourished and gorgeous Xmas season and 2025. May whatever your heart desires come easily to you. And thank you for supporting this group in the way you do - I always love how you comment, your humour, your thoughtfulness, your skills in challenging without triggering and your willingness to show vulnerability. Even if it's a loose tribe, I always feel as though the members of AofA are my tribe and it definitely makes getting older more relaxed, more resourced, more expansive. This is our way of re-imagining getting older. I'd love to hear what you've enjoyed in AofA this year. And thanks to all of you who support our Substack whether by writing for it or subscribing to it.
We heartily agree with Helen Mirren when she declares that saying - You look Good For Your Age - is not a compliment, it’s patronising and ageist. We don’t need it. We can simply look great. What’s the problem with that? But it’s important to call out these ageist phrases that get repeated again and again.
Yours truly was featured in Best magazine this week. Not my usual location of choice but the journalist, Kim Willis, has been lovely to me many times and we used it as a way of advocating for the fundamentals of the Advantages of Age philosophy. I did try to stop her being too positive. And the hero bit just makes me laugh. However was great to get the two Kates from Coffin Club in there who are revolutionising discussions around death, and Jama Elmi who was the Style King at the Advantages of Age Awards last year. I am 71 nearly 72.
We had fun with this question this week. So many members are buying their few Xmas presents at charity shops and have loved them for many many years. The answers ranged from a proper ukulele to baubles and Rolling Stone T-shirts, a Harley Davison shirt and red Jaeger coat to those who live in France lamenting the lack of charity shops there…
This post had the most and longest answers of the week. It was absolutely compelling to read about what our members’ grandparents did from miners to farmers to ones that made money from scrap iron and glamorous ones who picked up them up in lemon yellow jags from school. Spoke of a different era and also made me reflect even more about how important our grandparents were in our lives if we were lucky enough to have them.
And finally the delight of regional weather words and expressions. This started with me listening to The Verb and Ian MacMillan getting his gets to think of new poetic weather words. Pascale Petit came up with cloud ladders whereas Deryn Rees Jones suggesting noahing as a verb. Our members told us about ‘tamping’ in Wales, drookit for drenched in Scotland and some expressions like It’s looking a bit black over Bill’s mother’s…