Life in the Later Lane
Retirement sends Vonn Scott Bair full speed into long days as actor, playwright and game developer
"Do what you want, and you will never work a day in your life." That old adage,...
The play’s the thing as Michael Sullivan and the San Francisco Mime Troupe bring new meaning to “A Christmas Carol”
Michael Gene Sullivan’s version of Charles Dickens’ traditional “A Christmas Carol” is not about Scrooge, the miser...
From weddings, funerals and proms to Dead concerts, Mandela and Pope visits, Hoogasians have been flowering SF since 1928
In San Francisco in the 1950s and 1960s, before the internet, match.com, and social media, flower stands...
Seniors take on new roles with ‘Drama with Friends,’ a Zoom project that had its first live performance
Herbert and Gloria are flirting. Like spooning teens, the elderly pair are joking about their relationship and...
Podcast hosts leaned into aging, a topic they call ‘cutting edge’ and ‘sexy’
They met harvesting bananas on a kibbutz in Israel, part of a summer tour introducing young Jews...
Her name honors a famed New Zealand author. With her first novel published, Sally Abbott is also leading the life of a writer.
Sally Abbott believes her role as a novelist was written before she was born. It started with...
Retiree wants your blood: Donor Ambassador devotes his all to Red Cross collection efforts
Mark Sugarman wants to repair the world. The 79-year-old Financial District resident has spent his whole life...
Bruce Neuburger: The life of a student radical turned farmworker, turned author
Bruce Neuburger was never an armchair radical. Organizing against the Vietnam War while in the Coast Guard...
Three generations of a San Francisco family thrived running popular oceanside eatery overlooking Sutro Baths
It was, you might say, the last breakfast. On a summer Saturday in 2020, dozens of family...
Art and science vied for Sarah Young’s heart: Both found a place
Few who end up in the hospital are likely to be thinking about whether there’s a sufficient,...
Baking for bodily autonomy: Nan Wiener tackles controversial end of Roe v. Wade with brownies, macaroons, muffins and more
SENIOR BEAT GUEST COLUMN – Many years ago, I spent a year baking desserts in a restaurant...
New author and former drinker embracing alternative therapies to help others break the habit
Seated in the backroom of a café on Polk Street, Kevagne Kalisch leans against the wall and...
From fisherman to cook to inmate to owner: Frankie Balistreri’s odyssey to opening his dream restaurant
When his mother, Lucrezia, was diagnosed with cancer, then 25-year-old Frankie Gaetano Balistreri cared for her at...
Wisdom of the Japanese Tea Garden helped volunteer Chrisie Giordano come to accept a child’s absence
It’s an overcast summer morning, and Chrisie Giordano is leading a tour of Golden Gate Park’s Japanese...
It’s the little things that count for Margaret Lew, swept up in the world of miniature craftmanship
If you think dollhouses are just for children, you haven’t met the artisans and collectors, like Margaret...
Desire to learn mah-jongg helped Stephanie Riger overcome her own biases toward seniors
SENIOR BEAT GUEST COLUMN – Even though I’m 78 years old, I have resisted seeing myself as...
Retirement can be scary. Library worker hoping the end of his career will be the start of a happy new chapter
Seventy-one-year-old Richard Marino is on the cusp of retirement. And it’s making him anxious. He’s gone through...
German Gonzalez, the maestro of Golden Gate Park, has spread music and joy for more than 50 years
He was in the sixth grade and really wanted to be in the school band. But his...
At 67, Lauren McNamara has embarked on a new career and she’s charming customers at a downtown hotspot.
Lauren McNamara makes sure to remember where the regular clientele at Sam’s Grill like to sit. She...
You can get — almost — anything you want at Joseph Omran’s Nob Hill grocery store
LeBeau Market calls itself Nob Hill’s Community Grocery Store, where you can get almost everything: from Lay’s...
Deborah Drysdale: social justice evangelist, bridge instructor, and amateur mixologist
Summers for Deborah Drysdale meant idyllic days at her grandparents’ cattle ranch in the Blue Ridge mountains...
Jonah Raskin: Tireless Bay Area peace activist, prolific writer, and educator
Jonah Raskin was 10 in 1952, during the height of the anti-communist fervor of the Cold War....
She brought the magic to the screen, finding the perfect San Francisco location to shoot movies, TV shows, and commercials
If you’d been walking along one of the steepest streets in San Francisco one sunny afternoon in...
She relives history as a guide on the SS Jeremiah O’Brien, one of the WWII Liberty ships that brought troops and cargo to Normandy beaches
Eve Maher hands out programs to visitors boarding the SS Jeremiah O’Brien for a tour and memorial...
Pen pals from afar build rich relationship over 60 years through old-fashioned correspondence – no WhatsApp about it
A SENIOR BEAT GUEST COLUMN – My correspondence with Jutta Mengersen (now Brockhaus), the “World’s Ideal Pen...
This Mexican immigrant fought in the ring, started a dozen restaurants, raised five children, and never let defeat wear him down.
When 17-year-old Jose Heriberto Garcia came courting the young girl who’d become his wife, his future mother-in-law...
The ghosts of San Francisco’s past are still there if you only look and listen
SENIOR BEAT COLUMN: I got my first job in San Francisco nearly 40 years ago, in the...
Mutual support but separate hobbies and workshops keep crafty couple’s marriage going strong
A stained glass window by Bill and a "fishing" quilt Etta made for him adorn a hallway...
All Posts
Artists’ community working and aging together in shared space – for now
Residents of artists's community for quarter to nearly half a century have eight years left on their live-work lease.
Keeping the city clean, one candy wrapper, cigarette butt and newspaper flyer at a time
Melanie Grossman regularly picks up litter on the streets of Russian Hill. But when she does, she said, “people look at me like I’m insane.” That baffles her: “Don’t people care about their neighborhood, about making San Francisco a more livable city?” When Grossman and her family moved to the neighborhood about 20 years ago, ...
Lonely or troubled seniors find support, companionship on the Friendship Line
Society – and seniors themselves – view sadness and depression as a normal aspect of aging. Not wanting to be a burden on friends or family, they are often reluctant to reach out for emotional support. The Friendship Line is there to help. Read More...
Meals on Wheels a force against senior isolation, not just a food provider, CEO says
Ashley McCumber is on a mission to make San Francisco an age- and disability-friendly city. “It’s hard to grow old in San Francisco,” said the Meals on Wheels CEO and executive director, noting “the breakdown of neighborhoods, declining community participation in clubs, low voter turnout, all the way down to the way we treat others ...
Plenty of assistive devices to help those with ‘fumble fingers’ get through the day
SENIOR TECH – Do you use a credit card to pay for everything because digging into your wallet for the right bills or coin purse for just the right change has gotten too cumbersome? Is it impossible to pluck keys off the bottom of your purse without turning it upside down? Do you have trouble ...
Startups pitching products at Aging 2.0 conference focus on keeping people at home
Mid-November brought the Aging2.0 OPTIMIZE conference, a global network for innovators in aging to San Francisco. The conference attracted tech start-ups looking for partners and funding, and venture capitalists in search of new projects. As someone accustomed to the format of 90-minute presentations and roundtables at conferences addressing societal needs, Aging2.0s schedule of 5-minute pitches ...
