Author Archives: Karen Everett Watson

About Karen Everett Watson

Karen Everett Watson is a gerontologist and a freelance blogger/journalist. Her parents, grown children and 10 grandchildren keep her busy learning about life while living in the Sacramento Valley with her chickens and dogs.

The Happiest Time of Life

Heart Shaped Tree

Who are the happiest people you know? If you think about it very long, you might conclude that an older person in your life is perhaps the happiest. Research has shown that the happiest people are generally older people and those in their 70s are the happiest of all. So What Makes Older People Happy? […]

Moments that Last a Lifetime

Sunflower

We all have those special moments in our lives that we think back on. Some of these memories are of ordinary days and some are of a day that changed our lives forever. These are the thoughts that bring us through tough times. Even in our darkest moments, if we think about a certain experience […]

The Grace that Shines Through

Photo Credit: Children at the Weill public school in San Francisco pledge allegiance to the American flag in April 1942, prior to the internment of Japanese Americans. Photo attributed to Dorothea Lange(w). Public Domain.

February 19, 2017 was the 75th anniversary of the Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s executive order that put 120,000 Japanese Americans into internment camps. Most of them were citizens of our country. As the children of aging parents who have seen so much political unrest during their lifetime, we often don’t agree with their politics or their […]

If Tomorrow Never Comes

Sky, Tomorrow

None of us like to think about losing a loved one, especially a parent. Only those who have gone through it before can fathom what it’s like. I do know what it’s like to almost lose both my parents and that forced me to think about them being gone. For some reason when I was […]

Stories from the Front Porch

rocking chair on the porch

If the kitchen is the heart of the home, then porches of yesterday must have been the soul. It’s where babies were rocked, beans were snapped, fish tales were swapped and all the problems of the world were solved. Just thinking about a porch swing or some iron rocking chairs takes me back to my […]

Smelling My Way to Yesterday

Traditional American Breakfast

Just the smell of bacon frying and coffee perking can take me back to a cold November morning waking up in my Granny’s feather bed. I can feel the seven homemade quilts piled on me and the feeling of the cold linoleum floor on my feet as I headed for the kitchen where the most […]

Special Connections Make Life Wonderful!

Kitten paw, human hand

Our relationships are what make our lives worth living. Spending time with special people or even special critters can make all the difference in the lives of the elderly and ours as well. Thank goodness today we have innovative thinkers who are willing to reach outside a nursing home and create places that put older […]

Breaking Bread and Making Friends

Loaf of Bread

Meal time at an assisted living facility is about a lot more than nutrition — it’s about socializing! I loved helping out in the dining room when I worked in one. Many of the residents would come early to be seated so they could watch everyone coming in and avoid the rush of walkers and […]