A lot of us who are growing older, some with, others without spouses are looking for a new way to live. Not for us, nursing homes or living in Sun City. Florida or Arizona may be too far from our families.
We want, like we always did, more. We want to stay close to friends, be independent yet live in a community where new friends can be made, meals can be shared and neighbors counted on to help if needed. We want something affordable, easy to maintain yet comfortable and we don't want to become dependent on our children.
In talking with a few friends about the idea of living together sometime in the future, we agree on the physical and emotional virtues of living in a small community or neighborhood, but we never got to the point of figuring out where or how or when.
Luckily, Charles Durrett has published a handbook, Senior Co-housing, A Community Approach to Independent Living that gives us a process to follow when we get serious. Why make mistakes that other people have already made? Why not take advantage of the lessons learned elsewhere?
"Senior Cohousing: A Community Approach to Independent Living" (Charles Durrett)
His book will be helpful to many.
Posted by Jill Fallon at April 10, 2006 7:34 PM | PermalinkSenior or Elder Cohousing is one of the best models I've seen for living well and independently in the second part of our journey. I've been following its development for the past two years and can see it is becoming a grassroots phenomenon. Charles Durrett offers a training to help learn how to create these communities as does the Elder Cohousing Network. There are currently communities forming all over the US and you can get on an email list with the Elder Cohousing Network to keep you apprised of communities forming where you want to live. I'm personally very excited to know there will be great places to live, socialize and collaborate as we age.
Posted by: Kate deLaGrange at April 12, 2006 4:59 PM