Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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JUNE 4-10, 2014 UCW 5 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Like most human beings, I have always been interested in the doings of my own generation, the people whose lives have roughly paralleled my own and who share many of the same experiences, beliefs and memories. My generation, of course, are the famous — some might say infamous — Baby Boomers, the 77 million or so Americans born after World War II in the years between 1946 and 1964. We were so big and so special, at least in our own minds, that we have changed American culture in ways both positive and negative. Here is part of what the online encyclopedia Wikipedia says about the Baby Boomers. "Baby Boomers are associated with a rejection or redefinition of traditional values; however, many commentators have disputed the extent of that rejection, noting the widespread continuity of values with older and younger generations. In Europe and North America Boomers are widely associated with privilege, as many grew up in a time of widespread government subsidies in post-war housing and education, and increasing affluence. "As a group, they were the wealthiest, most active, and most physically fit generation up to that time, and amongst the first to grow up genuinely expecting the world to improve with time. They were also the generation that received peak levels of income, therefore they could reap the benefits of abundant levels of food, apparel, retirement programs and sometimes even 'midlife crisis' products. The increased consumerism for this generation has been regularly criticized as excessive. …. One feature of the Boomers was that they tended to think of themselves as a special generation." I have also long pondered the question of what makes marriages different. Almost all start with two people who declare that they love each other and want to stay together until death does them part. So why do some do just that happily, sometimes spectacularly, why do some just muddle through the years, and why are some marriages outright disasters which explode with fireworks and collateral damage to many around them? So imagine my fascination when I stumbled across a news story from the Miami Herald by Ana Veciana-Suarez entitled "Silver Divorces." It seems that the Boomers are doing something else prior generations have not done in large numbers. We are getting divorced in our 50s and 60s after marriages that have lasted two, even three, decades, sometimes more. U.S. Census data analyzed by the National Center for Family and Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University in Ohio finds that the divorce rate for Americans 50 and over doubled between 1990 and 2010. What's more, divorce in the 65-plus set, once quite rare, is now five times its rate in 1970. All this senior divorcing is occurring at the same time divorce rates in younger age groups are either flat or declining. What on earth is going on here? No one really knows what goes on inside anyone else's marriage, of course, but some researchers point to Boomers' sense of specialness, of being different from earlier generations. Says family therapist Robin Stillwell, "…we also see ourselves as younger than our parents felt at our age. People figure they have a good 20 or 30 years left and they want to get on with their lives while they can." Marriage is an ancient institution, unique to each couple, and, if they are lucky it adapts with them as they move through their lives. What is different today, though, is that with our increasingly long life spans, marriage is expected to adapt for a very long time. We Americans may have some bad habits — junk food, smoking, couch potato tendencies, but we also have good medical care. The average man today can expect to live 78.7 years. We women will go on a little longer, to 81.1 years. Let's assume our average couple married at 25. Their marriage will be adapting for more than 50 years, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is a long time to be married in most anyone's book. By contrast, the average life expectancy for Americans in 1930 was 59.7 for men and 61.6 for women. Assuming that couple also married at 25, their union would have had to adapt almost two decades less than today's couple's marriage. What is happening with Boomer marriages today is troubling on several fronts. There is the emotional pain inflicted on the couple and those who love them, of course, but there is more. Divorce often brings financial struggles, especially so when the couple is dependent on retirement income. There are also issues of companionship and care-taking, often considered built-in in a marriage. Just as we Boomers changed everything we encountered from public schools to college to the job market to attitudes about sex and parenting, we are also changing old age. We are living longer but we may not always be living happier. I Did but Now I Don't by MARGARET DICKSON MARGARET DICKSON, Contributing Writer, COMMENTS? Editor@upandcom- ingweekly.com.. 910.484.6200. Contest&RequestLine: 910-764-1073 www.christian107.com KeepingtheMainThing...theMainThing. visitusonline FocusontheFamily 20Countdown Magazine Adventures in Odyssey Serving Fayetteville Over 50 Years! 484-0261 1304 Morganton Rd. Mon-Sat: 6am-10pm Sun: 7am-2:30 pm Daily Specials • Fresh Seafood Hand Cut Steaks • Homemade Desserts Italian & Greek • Children's Menu Banquet rooms available up to 100 guests As a group, baby boomers were the wealthiest, most active, and most physically fit generation up to that time, and amongst the first to grow up genuinely expecting the world to improve with time.