President Obama swung by today's 2015 White House Conference on Aging & shared some time with attendees. Hey - when you have guests in your house, it's polite to at least say HI!
He appeared before a stellar list of experts & advocates for older Americans, all gathered at the White House to discuss a variety of issues about aging in America.
What a different conference than the last one, in 2005! Over the past ten years, the issues around aging in America have come to the fore. The energy around reform much have been pinging off the walls.
The president's comments surprised me - they were longer than the short but meaty comments delivered by the sponsor of the 05/18 Capitol Hill briefing on the NEA/NCCA Summit - Sen. Claire McCaskill. President Obama told the assembled attendees, "One of the best measures of a country is how it treats its older citizens. And by that measure, the United States has a lot to be proud of. We have to work to do more to ensure that every older American has the resources and the support that they need to thrive.”
It felt GREAT hearing President Obama say that one way to address our country's growing aging crisis is to improve family leave & provide more flexible hours. "I’m going to keep fighting to make family leave and workplace flexibility available to every American, no matter where they work. It’s the right thing to do."
John & I never had to face the cruxible of balancing work & caring for aging parents. His mother was surprisingly fit one moment, gone the next. Mom was fairly fit in spite of being somewhat frail & John's art studio was right next door to her bedroom. We've always appreciated that our experience is extremely rare. So many of our friends find themselves in situations with often no easy solutions, all too often heartbreaking choice.
So, thank you, Mister President.
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