6A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL January 21, 2015
Chatterbox
Prospectors and Golddiggers
Club awards announced
The
Something to share at every age
BY BETTY KAISER
For the Sentinel
L
ast week I celebrated another
birthday. I use the term “cele-
brate” loosely. In this seventh decade
of life, I am struggling with enjoying
aging and the losses that accompany
it. Yes, it’s true. I just exposed the el-
ephant in the room. The truth is that
aging gracefully is an art that many
of us have yet to master.
Some things don’t bother me at all.
I enjoy having young people open
heavy doors for me at shopping cen-
ters and saying, “After you, ma’am.”
A senior discount at restaurants is
nice. It’s great that I no longer have
to pop out of bed at the crack of dawn
to be at work by 7 a.m. And I’m hap-
py if I’m not invited to every party
in town.
I started turning gray at 40, so I
don’t even miss my beautiful black
hair with red highlights. At this age
our hair all looks alike anyway—ex-
cept for the ‘natural’ blonds among
us. In fact, I joke that when my
friends together we look like Q-tips!
And while I’m not happy about my
wrinkles, I’m not contemplating
plastic surgery.
I am, however, being pulled kick-
ing and screaming into an era of
less energy and forgetfulness. Or,
as I believe Erma Bombeck (my all
time favorite columnist) said, “Of all
the things I’ve lost in life, I miss my
mind the most!”
Isn’t that the truth? Once we reach
the age of 70, most of us look back
fondly on our golden years. The
years in which we remembered ev-
eryone’s names and wondered what
the heck was wrong with our parents,
who struggled to remember names
of people and places. “Oh, that was
Virginia, don’t you remember?” we
would piously spout.
Now we are the ones struggling
with memory lapses. My husband
and I often have a conversation that
goes like this:
Me: “Yesterday I saw the girl
with six kids that we went to church
with in Ventura.” Hubby: “ Who was
that?” Me: “Oh, you know, she had
long red hair and lived near us.” Hub-
by: “I have no idea who you’re talk-
ing about.” Me: “Of course you do.
Kathy used to babysit for them. Her
husband was a pharmacist.” Hubby:
“Oh, yeah, his name was…I forget.”
Three days later we remember that
her name is Jan and his name was
Bob. Frustrating.
I suppose that turning 100 years old
is something to get excited about. As
a reporter, I covered many a centenar-
ian’s birthday. Most of them seemed
quite content to just “be.” They are
happy to look at where they’ve been
and reminisce about the good old
days with anyone who cares to listen.
Their contribution is wisdom.
Fortunately, I’m not there yet. I of-
ten say that I am in the middle age of
old age. Mentally I’m pretty active.
I’m always planning our next trip,
keeping up with what’s going on in
the family, volunteering, teaching and
writing. Physically, I’ve really slowed
down. Exercise no longer consists of
a three times weekly aerobics class
and seven-mile hikes or bike rides.
Now I have a stretching routine, walk
the dogs over to Wilson Creek Park
and hop on my stationary bike.
I’m not alone in my aging frustra-
tion. Many others wonder if there
is life after 70 or 90. Surely there
is something more for us to do than
watch TV. It can’t be too late for us
to make a contribution to the greater
good of mankind. So when are we
“too old”? At what age do we sit back
and say, “I give up. Let someone else
do the work?”
Tucked away in a book on my desk,
I found this list of famous people who
didn’t know it was time to stop being
creative or sharing what they do best
when they turned the corner into old
age:
At 81, Founding Father Benjamin
Franklin engineered the diplomacy
that led to the adoption of the U.S.
Constitution.
At 82, Winston Churchill wrote the
four-volume work, “A History of the
English Speaking Peoples.”
At 82, Leo Tolstoy completed “I
Cannot Be Silent.”
At 83, Johann Wolfgang von
Goethe completed “Faust.”
At 88, Cellist Pablo Casals was
still performing cello concerts.
At 89, Pianist Arthur Rubinstein
gave one of his greatest recitals in
New York’s Carnegie Hall.
At 90, Cubist and collage artist
Pablo Picasso still drew and sculpt-
ed.
At 91, Samon de Valera served as
president of Ireland.
At 93, George Bernard Shaw wrote
“Farfetched Fables.”
At 98, Renaissance master Titian
painted “Battle Lepants.”
At 100, Grandma Moses was still
painting. She began at age 76!
Looking at the above list kind of
makes me feel like a whiner. Sure I’m
older and I can’t do the things that I
used to do. But am I old enough to do
nothing? Obviously not. Looking at
the above list tells me that we have
something to share at every age.
When we were young, we waited
for life to begin. We were always
looking forward to next week, next
month and next year. Now that we’re
older and have less time, our fountain
of youth has changed. It is today. Our
joys must be found in the moments
of life.
The struggle against aging is fu-
tile, but we can still live a full life.
As my husband likes to say, “Old age
is putting on new wheels and going
in a different direction.” I say that we
just keep doing what we love…but at
a slower pace.
My morning mantra comes from
the Psalms: “This is the day that the
Lord has made, I will rejoice and be
glad in it.”
Can I get an Amen?
A
t its annual Sourdough Banquet
on Saturday Jan. 10, the Cottage
Grove Prospectors and Golddiggers
Club celebrated a successful year that
included its 50th anniversary of serving
the Miners Breakfast on the Mountain
on the Sunday of Bohemia Mining Days
last July. Club President Bruce McDon-
ald served as the emcee of the event. He
shared some of the club’s early history
and presented the awards.
Club members vote on two of the
awards that recognize a Prospector and
a Golddigger who performed above and
beyond the normal call of duty in the
previous year. The George Award hon-
ors a man and the Order of the Purple
Garter honors a woman who has dem-
onstrated a high degree of personal
dedication and service to the club. This
year’s winners were Joe Haskins and
Sara Smith.
The Civic Pride Award is given to a
local business or organization that made
a signifi cant contribution to the better-
ment of Cottage Grove or South Lane
County. This year’s award went to Paul
Tocco, owner of Buster’s Main Street
Café. Last July, to celebrate the Golden
Anniversary of the Club’s legendary
Miners Breakfast on the Mountain,
Tocco provided $25 gift certifi cates,
which the club offered to its 1008 din-
ers for half price and kept the proceeds.
The award also honored Tocco for pro-
viding a free meal for all veterans on
the eleventh day of each month and for
giving away $25 gift certifi cates to each
member of the 2014 senior class at Cot-
tage Grove High School and Kennedy
Alternative High School.
The fi nal award given at the annual
banquet was the President’s Award.
President McDonald honored two of the
younger members of the 55-year-old or-
ganization: Jeff Cook and Tracy Fetter.
At the banquet, McDonald’s shared
some of the club’s early history. The
Prospectors and Golddiggers Club was
founded in 1959, as part of Cottage
Grove’s local centennial celebration of
Oregon becoming America’s 33rd state
on Valentine’s Day in 1859. The pur-
pose of the club is “Prospecting better
things for Cottage Grove.”
Following the successful Centennial
Celebration, the club established the
annual Bohemia Mining Days Festival,
which it organized on the third week-
end in July until it became its own or-
ganization. From its inception, the club
membership has been by invitation
only and designed to make community
service fun. In its early years the club
was for men only and operated in secret
with members using nicknames, such
as “Stinky Pete.” Later, members of the
Golddiggers auxiliary group became
full members in the club.
Ray Nelson, one of the original Pros-
pectors, was a miner in the Bohemia
Mining District and a visionary who
had a passion for local history. In the
mid-1960s, Nelson spearheaded the
effort to save the historic Dr. Snapp
House from a burn-to-learn exercise, so
Lane County could build the Riverview
Terrace Apartments on Main and River
Road. The county sold the Victorian
Queen Anne-style home, built by one
of the town’s fi rst doctors, for $1 and
it was moved a few blocks away to its
present site at 360 S. River Road.
Nelson’s dream was to capitalize on
the newly constructed I-5 Freeway and
boost tourism by developing Prospec-
tor Park into a replica of early Cottage
Grove that would include a general
store, hotel, blacksmith shop, livery,
etc. His dream could not be realized
after zoning changes in the 1970’s des-
ignated the property’s location, at the
confl uence of Silk Creek and the Coast
Fork of the Willamette River, as a fl ood-
way and prevented the building of ad-
ditional structures.
Today, club fundraisers continue
Nelson’s dream by maintaining the
community’s only Victorian-era house
open to the public and Prospector Park
next door. The fundraisers also provide
annual scholarships to Cottage Grove
High School graduates seeking to fur-
ther their education.
Betty Kaiser’s Chatterbox is about
people, places, family, and other
matters of the heart. Contact her at
942-1317 or via e-mail —
bchatty@bettykaiser.com
2015
Cottage Theatre presents
A comic “triángulo de amore” set in 1950s Havana
Directed by Tony Rust
spo
nso
red
by:
January 30, 31, February 1*
February 5, 6, 7, 8* • 12, 13, 14, 15*
*matinee
Tickets available online, by phone, or at the door one hour before performance
Thursday−Saturday 8:00 pm; Sunday 2:30 pm. $19 Adult, $16 Youth (age 6−18)
www.cottagetheatre.org • 541-942-8001 • 700 Village Drive • Cottage Grove