IN THIS MODERN AGE…

IN THIS MODERN AGE... By Dale Jodoin In this day and age, it’s become popular to point fingers at Boomers. You hear it everywhere—“They had it easy,” “They ruined the economy,” “They’re the problem.” But no one ever stops to ask what happens when seniors lose everything. When a lifetime of work, bills paid, children raised, and pride kept turns into nothing more than a shopping cart and a park bench. You don’t see many headlines about seniors becoming homeless. But it’s happening. Right now. Every day. Quietly. People in their 50s, 60s, even well into their 70s, are sleeping on sidewalks and shelter mats, not because they made bad choices—but because life, plain and simple, gave them the short end. Here’s the part we don’t want to admit: the longer you work, the harder your body breaks. The wear and tear shows up in every joint. The knees swell. The hips grind. The spine stiffens. The hands curl with arthritis. And when the body gives out, the job usually goes right with it. Maybe they’re let go. Maybe they can’t physically keep up. Maybe their boss just wants someone younger. And once that paycheck stops, things fall apart fast. Rent is missed. Groceries are skipped. The car gets sold. The next thing you know, a man who spent forty years working is standing in a soup kitchen line wondering how he got here. But even then, even standing there with his life crumbling, he won’t ask for help. Because pride is the one thing he still has left. That pride, the kind that built homes and raised families, becomes a curse when you’ve got nothing. It keeps seniors from reaching out. It keeps them quiet, curled up under a worn-out blanket in minus thirty weather, just trying to survive another night. Now picture this: your hips are gone, bone-on-bone. Your hands barely open. You haven’t slept right in weeks. You’re in a crowded shelter, surrounded by strangers. Some of them are angry, some violent. If you speak up, you might get beaten for it. If you say nothing, you might lose your only blanket. So you make yourself small. You find a corner. You try to disappear. But not everyone in those shelters is cruel. Some of the young people in there—those who’ve also lost homes, jobs, families—see the older folks and step in. They give them a spot in line. They pass over a sandwich. They keep an eye out while the senior rests. These young ones don’t do it for thanks. They do it because they still understand what respect looks like, even in places where respect is usually long gone. And that matters. A lot. Still, most seniors don’t make it to shelters. Many can’t. The beds are limited. The places are dangerous. Some have wheelchairs with dead batteries and no place to charge them. Others can’t walk the blocks to get there because their joints scream in pain. Health nurses are posted miles away, and they won’t come to the person—they expect the person to come to them. But how do you get there when you can’t even stand? And what about money? The pensions supposed to come every month, right? But where do they send it? You don’t have an address when you’re living in a tent behind the strip mall. You don’t get phone calls when your battery’s dead and your charger got stolen. You fall through the cracks. Then you fall even further. Until you’re invisible. And most people just walk by, assuming the worst. And even the little jobs they used to count on—like working part-time at Tim Hortons or McDonald’s—those are gone too. There was a time when an older person could stand behind a counter, move a little slower, greet customers with a smile, and still feel like they mattered. It wasn’t glamorous, but it gave them purpose and dignity. Now? Those spots are filled with foreign workers brought in on contracts, paid less, expected to move faster, and told not to question it. Seniors don’t even get looked at anymore. They’re too slow, too stiff, too “in the way.” So they get nothing. Not even a chance. But you know what? Even then, the heart still beats. I’ve seen an old man with a limp and a split lip put himself between a junkie and his girlfriend because he couldn’t stand to see her hit again. He didn’t have a home, didn’t have clean socks, but he had enough strength to take a beating for a stranger. That’s who these men and women are. They’re not a problem. They’re the people who once built this country with their hands. And now they sit in doorways holding a paper cup they can barely grip. They don’t beg. They just ask. And even then, some can’t reach out to take the coin because arthritis has locked their hands shut. Meanwhile, we’ve got months for everything now. Black History Month. Pride Month. Heritage days. Every culture gets recognition—and rightfully so. But where’s the month for seniors? Where’s the public funding to make sure they have warm food and a safe place to sleep? Where’s the respect? Because when they were younger, they had it. We gave it. But now? Most people look away, mutter something about pensions, or worse, joke about how they should just “get with the times.” It’s sickening, really. These are the same people who fought wars, built roads, stocked shelves, cleaned schools, raised kids, ran farms, and did every job that younger folks now scoff at. “Let someone else do it,” the new attitude says. Well, these seniors were someone else. And they did it without complaint. So now that their hands can’t lift anymore and their legs barely carry them—what, they’re supposed to just disappear? This isn’t just a sad story. It’s a warning. Because we’re all heading there. If we’re lucky, we grow old. And if we’re really lucky, we grow old with dignity. But that dignity is vanishing. Fast. And once it’s gone, good luck getting it back. You laugh at the elderly now—until you're them. You brush them off—until it’s you on the bus with no one offering a seat. The difference is, when they were young, they had respect for their elders. Now, they are the elders, and all they get is silence. So what can we do? Start here. Don’t look away. If you see a senior on the street, don’t assume they’re an addict or a lost cause. Look again. That could be a retired carpenter, a grandmother, a war vet. Someone who paid rent for 45 years before one bad turn knocked them over. If they hold out a hand, don’t overthink it. Just help. Not because they asked—but because they shouldn’t have to. The seniors of today were the workers, soldiers, parents, and builders of yesterday. Their pride was earned, not given. And while it may keep them quiet, it’s still there, holding them together, even when everything else has fallen apart. They are not a burden. They are not the past. They are us—just a few years ahead. And the way we treat them now is the exact way we’ll be treated later. So maybe it’s time we stop blaming them and start honouring them—before it’s too late.