Middle Age

I’ve discussed hobbies in this column before, but I am looking at it from another angle now. When we talked about them before, it was mostly the negative aspects about my approach to them, namely I have too many of them. I collect them. Collecting is also another hobby I overdo, so I suppose collecting too many hobbies is a double whammy. At any rate, we have only spoken of the negative before, so I’d like to flip the script today and talk about the upside of hobbies. I did some web searches and found some interesting things about hobbies in regard to those of us middle-aged and older. Here is my take on what that revealed about how hobbies can improve mental health and even help us keep our faculties.

Notice that I said earlier that I did a web search. I’m not like some who claim to have done research (consisting of watching a video or two on YouTube) while postulating some hair-brained idea. I wanted to do some actual research with human guinea pigs, uh, I mean, test subjects, but I couldn’t find any volunteers. I don’t get why they were hesitant. I was just going to take up about half of their time having them take on difficult but rewarding hobbies and then subject them to rigorous mental testing before and after, all without charging them one penny. Alas, no one took me up on it. Oh, well. We will have to settle for what I found on the web.

It turns out that having a hobby can be a vital part of our brain health as we age. It is especially so if the hobby is a goal-oriented one. Something that has an easily measurable outcome. Things like learning to play a musical instrument, learning a new language and using it in some way, such as expanding your ministry to a foreign field or even areas nearby that have people who only speak their native tongue well. Learning to do something outside your comfort zone, like welding. Yes, welding. That was specifically mentioned in one of the articles I read. Interesting, because I recently started in on that hobby. I think that brings me up to about 752 hobbies now, which may seem a little high, but at one time the number was much higher. Just ask my wife. On second thought, please don’t.

It is important to schedule time for your hobby too. Set aside time dedicated to that hobby. Work at getting into the flow of it. Get lost in it and the stresses of your life will go away. It takes time to develop a habit, so set an alarm each day to remind yourself to do it. After a while, you won’t need that alarm.

BY J.B. COLLUM +

If you aren’t retired yet — and who can afford to retire right now anyway? I mean, if you want to eat eggs, you need a good job. Anyway, as I was saying, if you aren’t retired yet, pick up a hobby that is in no way related to your job. The point of a hobby is to get your mind off of the stressful part of your life, and if your job isn’t stressful, you probably don’t even need a hobby. But if that is the case, we all hate you. Not really, but secretly, yes. Yes, we do.

Another important aspect about having a hobby as an older person is that it gives you something to talk about. I mean, something to talk about other than your health issues. As much as this pains us all to learn, nobody, and I do mean nobody, wants to hear all about what ails you, what medicines you take for it, how the doctor visit went, blah, blah, blah. Even if they ask! They are just being polite! If you don’t like talking to people, you can use that kind of conversation to have all the solitude you want. When I hear about some old person in the news who had been dead in their house for weeks or even months before anybody noticed, first I think about how sad that is, and then I think that they probably droned on and on about their health when anyone dropped by or called. And that’s what happens. So if you don’t want to die in your home and have nobody notice for weeks, get a hobby and have something fun to talk about.

My best friend recently said that he thinks my working at home, plus so much isolation during these Covid years, has made me anti-social. He’s wrong, but he isn’t too far off the mark. I am less social, but I will get out and do things with people. I have just gotten more picky about what, when, where, and with who. Aging is part of that. I don’t like driving at night if it can be avoided. Especially in busy traffic. I also like to be home and in bed well before midnight. Actually, I want to be home and in my pajamas, lying back in my recliner by eight at the latest, but I can stay out later for special occasions. However, this brings us to another benefit of some hobbies. You can do many hobbies with others, which gets you out there making friends or renewing friendships. At the very least, you can join an online community of people who share the hobby and discuss it at length with people who actually want to talk about it. And at best, you can meet up with real live people to share your hobbies, teach others about them, or just join a group that gets together periodically to celebrate those hobbies.

Hobbies can be a great way to build friendships, keep our minds active, take our minds off the stresses of life, including our health issues, and help us keep friends from drifting away. I’d say that is a win-win situation, or maybe a win-win-win for folks who don’t have to hear about our slipped disc or our bunion for the umpteenth time.

J.B. Collum is a local novelist, humorist and columnist who wants to be Mark Twain when he grows up. He may be reached at johnbcollum@ gmail.com