Think back. When was the last time you listened to your favorite eight-track tape? Or rewound a VHS? Or buffed a CD to keep it from skipping? If you’re old enough to understand any of those references, then Cathleen Toomey, host of the upcoming New Hampshire PBS local series SENIORITY AUTHORITY, has another cultural relic for you to give up—negative attitudes toward aging. In a recent conversation, Toomey summed it up plainly: “You are lucky if you are aging!”
“Ageism is baked into our culture,” she said. “It’s in how we have conversations and how we represent ourselves. And the truth is that we have it all wrong.” With life expectancies extending into the eighties and nineties, Toomey thinks that taboos around age are past their prime. “It’s like saying the eight-track tape is still viable. This ageism is outmoded, but people haven’t picked up on that yet.”
For Toomey, this realization came when she began working at RiverWoods Group, a non-profit continuing care community. Up to that point, she had had few role models for what being an older adult might look like. “All but one of my grandparents died before I was born, so I had limited awareness.”
Yet, when she got to RiverWoods, the community that greeted her defied expectations. “I met these residents who were incredible. They were lively and involved and interested in how Riverwoods operated,” she shared. She met one resident, Nancy Alcock-Hood, who, after a career as a globetrotting biochemist, fell in love and married for the first time at 84. “She had all of these adventures, but when the time for meeting someone special came up, her heart was totally open.”
As Toomey’s horizons were broadening, her role at Riverwoods meant she became the go-to guru for friends and family’s questions about health and aging. “One of my best friends there was head of nursing, so I would ask her their questions,” Toomey recalled with a laugh. “She’d tell me the answer, I’d call the friend back.”
Toomey realized that if her social circle had these questions, other people had them too. With that in mind, the Seniority Authority podcast was born, with the goal of helping people of all ages get smarter about getting older. Each episode featured actionable steps listeners can take to prepare for their futures.
“People don’t plan ahead,” Toomey pointed out. “Really, really smart people that plan to buy a home, educate their children, take vacations…something happens to them when they get to be 70 or 75. They just shut down.”
Now, with the premiere of SENIORITY AUTHORITY as a television series, Toomey and the show’s producer, Kathleen Young, want to do even more to shed light on aging well—not just for senior citizens but also for their children. Toomey said they’re asking how these messages play out in real life. “We’re going out into the field and talking to people.”
Putting this effort into stories on aging isn’t something Toomey thinks she’d be able to do anywhere but PBS. “I think this happened at NHPBS because people are focused on education and learning,” she said. “I can’t see any other channel taking the time, investing the resources”. Even with this passion, local productions aren’t possible without funding. SENIORITY AUTHORITY only became a reality once major funder Road Scholar stepped up to sponsor the series.
For Toomey’s part, she’s thrilled to be able to share the lessons she’s learned with a wider audience. “I like to say that ‘aging is a gift not everyone gets to unwrap.’” And Toomey knows there’s a lot of life to be lived in our later years. “If you are here, there’s more the world needs from you!”
SENIORITY AUTHORITY premieres on Monday, September 8th at 7:30 PM on NHPBS. Episodes will also be available to stream free on the PBS App and at nhpbs.org/seniorityauthority.