Hello, my name is Leslie Kane.
I am the host of the Why Not Today podcast.
This is a podcast to celebrate people who have been courageous and said, Why Not Today?
I started this podcast in honor of my father, Patrick Kane, who often did say, Why Not Today.
I'm based in Reston, Virginia, a planned community right outside of Washington, D.C., and thanks
for joining us today.
And my guest today is somebody who was recommended, but I've known, and I can't believe we really
haven't met before because there's a million connections.
But today we have Steve Gurney, who is the director of Positive Aging Community.
And so I would like to start with talking about connections and, you know, how we connect
with people.
And Steve, I've known from the Reston community, he was and still is, big into paddle boarding
and knew who he was and just a couple of events when he was there.
But recently I was talking to a friend of mine whose parents are going through some aging
situations.
I can't even talk to Steve Gurney.
And then when we looked and talked to each other, it's like we both grew up in the same
town.
We went to the same high school.
And even after Steve that we talked the other day, I mentioned you to my sister and she
was at another event and your name came up and she's like, How have I heard that name?
So it's so funny how that's just all the connections.
So welcome.
Small world.
Yes, Reston is a very small world.
So welcome.
We're excited to have you on and talking about aging.
And I'm really trying to focus on subjects that people, my audience is kind of concerned
with and happening in life.
And we're all the age group I'm surrounded with.
And a lot of my listeners are kind of that sandwich generation.
Our parents are getting older.
We're getting older in lots of different situations.
So I thought you'd be a great resource.
So before we get started, why don't you introduce yourself, tell us a little bit about you and
a fun fact that nobody would know.
Oh boy.
Geez.
So first off, as you had mentioned, grew up in the Reston community and went away to
school.
And when I was in college, my grandfather needed to go to a nursing home.
And I observed firsthand what my family had to go through when you have a life change
like that.
And it was surprising to me that there wasn't a guide that made it easier for folks to understand
all the different options.
When you're being discharged from a hospital and somebody tells you you got to go to a
nursing home, what are the choices and where do you go and what have you.
And so when I graduated, I put together a little guide at the time it was called Guide
to Retirement Living.
I didn't think I was starting a business.
I just wanted something on my resume to help me get a better job.
And here I am 33 years later.
Wow.
I have a lot of publication that I publish is called the Positive Aging Source Book and
it lists all the different resources in the DC metro area, how much they cost, what's
included in the cost, whether it be housing or aging in place or other resources.
And I've been doing that for 33 years.
I sold the business to the Washington Post and I ran it under their ownership for over
20 years.
And about four years ago, I bought it back and I'm running it on their own again.
And the pandemic is really what sort of created the new platform that I have that is much
more interactive and therefore we've rebranded it the Positive Aging Community or the Pro
Aging Community.
And what happened is before the pandemic, I would host a lot of live and interactive
events for senior living professionals that were in person.
And when we couldn't meet in person, I moved our gatherings to online and over the last
few years, what's happened is that those online discussions on every topic on aging,
we could ever imagine, have grown from just being professionals to now all of our discussions
have older adults, their loved ones and influential senior living professionals.
And we talk about everything under the sun.
But hopefully that wasn't too long of an...
That's okay.
I want to talk about some of those things.
But before I do that, what's a fun fact that people would know about Steve Burney?
Well, I'm going to just jump right into it because the title of your podcast is Why Not
Today?
And in my career, a real Why Not Today moment that I had was that I woke up one day and
realized I was an expert in senior housing and in senior living.
And I never spent the night in one of these communities.
I'd interviewed hundreds of people.
I visited over 500.
I knew a lot about them.
I helped a lot of people make the transition, but I'd never experienced what it's like to
actually live in one of these communities.
And it sort of struck me as it's like working in a restaurant but not eating the food.
And so I'm 57 now.
When I was 43, I moved in and I lived in five different senior living communities as a resident
temporarily.
But it really gave me a great perspective that I've been able to share with our community
members and given me a different perspective on the whole senior living industry in general.
Yeah, I bet.
When you told me that the other day, I'm like, wow, that is definitely a Why Not Today and
a Craziest Thing to Try.
And that was, it wasn't like just one night.
But you really immersed yourself.
Well, you know you're doing something right when the people in the industry that work
in these communities say things like, better you than me, or why are you doing that?
And it's sort of, and we can get into it a little bit later, but ideally the people that
are creating and managing and working at these communities should be, we should be working
in communities that we'd want to live in ourselves.
So, you know, we can get to that point.
Yeah, definitely want to talk about that.
Before we do that, what's the definition of courage to you?
What is courage?
Oh, courage.
Geez.
This is a good question.
This is like a job interview kind of.
But I think, you know, I think courage is the ability, I mean, to try something that
is going to make you feel uncomfortable and knowing that just by trying it, you're going
to make some connections and you're going to be a better person going out the other
side.
That's a great definition.
I love the connection because I'm all about connection.
Yeah, and I would say that the older we get, the more courage we get because we've seen
more, we've seen that, you know, when you're a young kid and you're going into a room where
you don't know anybody, how scary that can be, or the first day of school or what have
you, but the older we get and the more life experience we have and the more examples of
courage that we exhibit and we see that life is actually better when you take those risks
and move there the better it is.
And that's one of the benefits of having a multi-generational community is that these,
the stories of courage that our elders can share with us.
Yeah, that's awesome.
And I love that, you know, your definition and with the connections because I think that's,
you know, connections make a big difference and that you're so right that, you know, when
we're younger, we're afraid, you know, the things we did, they're going to be, you know,
we're going to die or the boogeyman under the bed and all those things like, why did
we believe all that?
As you get older, you're like, oh, it's not going to be that bad and it is better.
Now I think the younger generation where they have the advantage of courage is they're not
afraid to play on a computer or a phone.
Like, you know, my mom is terrified that she's going to screw some up and she has, but kids
are like, I'll try it.
What the heck?
What do I have to lose?
Yeah, yeah.
But the, you know, the whole concept of the Red Hat Society, which is a group of predominantly
older women who get together and they wear these crazy red hats and these outlandish outfits.
And the whole premise of that is that, you know, when we were younger, we dressed the
way that they wanted us, this, that and the other.
And now we're just out there, you know, strutting our stuff.
And I'm willing to bet that the women that are in the red hat, that go to these events
wearing the red hats and things like that, you know, if you asked them to do that in
their 20s or 30s, no way, I'm not going to do that.
But, you know, the whole, I think that whole club was sort of formed on courage and having
courage together and being with a community.
I never thought about that group, but that's a great group that represents courage.
I need to find somebody to interview.
I know they have like the younger group of that is the Purple Hat Group.
The Purple Hat Group.
Oh, geez.
Yeah.
But I didn't, you know, obviously know more senior people and I did get more involved
in the senior community teaching water works for 13 years.
And there's so many things I learned in a pool with these older adults, so many things
I could share.
So I love your business and what you're doing and helping.
I love the community.
And I think that's the one thing my friend Leanne, which is like, you need to talk about
this, Steve, is that I am all about connection and community and come by it naturally as
my dad was a community, was a city planner and was all about community and his company
was community development and so many things in aging.
So I know you've done a lot of other things in your life courageous, but let's talk about
the aging world and what are some of the things that I think, you know, it does take
courage to face things we don't know.
And there's so many things we don't know in the aging.
And I think a lot of people are kind of afraid to look at it.
So talk to me about some of the things that you've learned or I know we talked about a
couple of different subjects before we came on about things that people need courage to
do and really they're not that bad that you just need to say why not today and do it.
Yeah, exactly.
And I would say that the first thing in terms of why not today is to have conversations about
your future.
And this like you should be doing this through the entire lifespan is that, you know, is
talking with your circle of friends and family about, you know, the future and the next chapters
in your life.
But as we grow older, and we're all growing older, and this is the whole thing we use
aging the wrong way aging starts on the delivery room table.
It doesn't start with an AARP card.
Everybody is aging at the exact same rate who's alive, who's lucky enough to be alive.
And we need to remind ourselves of that.
But as we grow older, there are some things that there's no crystal ball, there's no guarantee
anything is going to happen to us.
But you know, there's a better chance that your mobility might be compromised.
There's a potential chance that you could, you know, develop things like dementia and
Alzheimer's.
The older you get the higher the percentage it goes.
And no matter and none of us have a crystal ball.
So having conversations in advance is the first thing that is why not today.
Now, I mentioned we have these weekly discussions on my in my community and our number one topic
is the topic of solo aging.
Okay, and solo aging, I love this discussion topic, because it's a conversation that we
can all have.
Now, a lot of times, when people hear the term solo aging, they instantly think about,
Oh, you know, somebody who never married and doesn't have any family around, that's a solo
age or and yeah, that is probably a definition of a solo age or and and most people in this
category are very empowered because they recognize that they don't have a safety net
that I've got to plan.
I've got to think about what happens if I have, you know, a surgery, who's going to
bring me home from the house and how am I going to be taken care of and things like that.
And most people who define themselves as solo ages are in that bucket.
But what I love doing is going to a barbecue or something like that and the topic of solo
aging pops up and somebody looks at me kind of funny.
And I was like, Hey, not something that you really need to worry about.
And they're like, Well, yeah, I've got three kids.
It's like, Okay, let me ask you something.
What are the chances that you and your partner are going to pass away at the same time?
Well, that's probably not going to happen.
So one of you is going to live the other.
And then those three kids, do you really want them taking care of you if something happened?
Well, no.
And so put it in our turn of like, yeah, the people around you on what would happen if
I was by myself in the future and who could I turn to?
It's very important because if something happens and you haven't had those conversations, usually
you're going to be, you know, disrupting somebody's life.
And none of us really want to do that.
So yeah, my mom's in a situation with a neighbor who is younger than my mother has dementia
and isn't married.
She's divorced.
Her family's not close physically.
They weren't really that close at all.
And my mother and another neighbor are taking care of this woman who's got dementia.
I'm like, we need to get other resources.
So yeah, so as far as your community and people, your discussions, is that open to anybody?
It's a.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
If you just go to the website, proaging.com, that's probably the easiest way to get there.
You'll see recordings of over 300 discussions that we've had and podcasts.
And then you'll also see the schedule of what we've got coming up.
And, you know, I think that the live and interactive nature of our discussions is what
makes them a lot of fun and very interesting and also a great resource to get questions
answered and make connections that can solve the things that you're thinking about today.
And so we welcome any and all to join in.
And we have so many of these things.
It's sort of like there's there's probably one that you might find interesting.
Yeah, that's awesome.
Yeah.
And I will definitely link your information, the show notes of all the discussions because
I have so many friends that are having that situation.
I never thought I'd you hear about it, but you never thought you'd be in a situation of
your own aging and the shifting of the demographic is occurring.
And there's lots of positive things about that.
Excuse me.
And and there's lots of challenging things about that.
You know, we're going to have more people over the age of 65 than we've ever had in
history.
We've got workplace shortages and and the, you know, some of the positive things is
technology is developing.
But one of the things that you just mentioned there is that a lot of my friends are going
through this with their parents.
And what that is doing is that's essentially training for our future elders.
And because so many people basically say, I never knew this stuff existed.
I never knew how expensive it is.
I never knew that this was going to take this much work.
And now that they're experiencing that firsthand, hopefully I hear this on a regular basis is
I'm going to take steps so that my kids don't have to go through this, or I'm going to take
steps so that since I'm by myself that I've got a network that can help me if something
happens.
Right.
So yeah, let's talk about that.
So somebody that's like, all right, I need to prepare.
They're going to be proactive.
And what, what are your resources?
What are the resources people have?
How can we get educated and be courageous to say why not today now?
Instead of when we're in crisis, which really usually was what happens.
Like I am blessed.
I'm one of six kids.
So my dad has had had some health issues and had a stroke and then did pass away.
But you know, there were six of us, well, five, because one of my siblings has down syndrome,
so she wasn't a big player in it.
But you know, we all kind of fell in our roles of who did what and had had resources, but
I've got friends that are only children.
And I'm like, how the heck do you do that?
Well, I mean, Leslie, you're really, you're really fortunate to have a tight knit family
that communicates because a lot of times the only child has a lot easier than six varying
opinions of what should, what should happen.
I can't say everything's always smooth, but we do pretty much fall in our roles.
I have one brother that will quiz a doctor till he's blue in the face.
The doctor helps me.
So I'm like, okay, Brian's like, well, why didn't you ask this?
Why didn't you?
I'm like, I don't know.
That's your job.
Yeah.
So how do we go ahead of this?
And what do we do?
Yeah.
So number one is to familiarize yourself with, you know, the resources that are out there
and that, you know, folks can get the positive aging source book to just kind of see the
different resources that are available or just go to proaging.com.
But I think free book you get free of charge.
And but the, I think the most important thing is to have conversations about these types
of decisions that might happen.
And they, they, they might not happen too.
But one of the easiest ways to do this is like you have just had, you know, you shared
a story about a neighbor that has Alzheimer's and no real family caregivers is, you know,
talking to your circle of friends and your network of support and your kids and your
best friend about, hey, you know, I got this neighbor who has dementia and there's no caregivers
there.
Do you ever think about what you would do if you had dementia?
And just have a conversation about it.
The it's, it's very hard because we feel like like it's like having a conversation about
death and dying.
It's hard to have that because we feel like, oh, wow, I don't want to talk about that.
You know, well, I mean, if you don't talk about it, then your support network doesn't
know what your wishes are if you are reaching end of life.
And while I, while these are difficult conversations to have, I feel that the conversations that
I have on this topic and I have so many these days are some of the most deep and meaningful
and thought provoking conversations that I'm a part of.
And so it really is one of these why not today is is that, you know, just, just have a conversation
with your family, you know, let them know what you want.
Now I'm going to give your listeners kind of one sort of word of wisdom here is that
oftentimes these conversations when you talk about, let's say that you're talking with
a parent or loved one about a neighbor that moved to a senior living community.
A lot of times what, what somebody will say is, oh, don't ever take me to one of those
places.
I want to go to one of those places.
That's an opportunity to sort of, hey, why don't we go have lunch and visit our friend
who's there at that place.
And because I'm a little concerned that, you know, that you're digging your heels in,
what if you're you were lonely and isolated and all alone at home, what if your home was
no longer safe and opening that door because I can tell you there are so many adult children
that I talked to that basically mom said she never wanted to go to one of those places.
And now they're, they're moving heaven and earth to meet that wish.
And it's not necessarily the healthiest setup for the individual.
But I know through your services you provide, you give suggestions of good facilities.
Well what we, we work more.
Yeah.
So, so, and that's, you know, I, we could do a whole another hour, but I'll sort of
amend it is, is that, you know, we, there's no best place out there.
Okay.
But, but here's some tips on how to find the best place for your mom and dad or yourself
is that number one, having you or your loved ones be part of the community.
It's similar to go into school.
When you drop your kid off at school, you don't just drop them off and, and, and, and
you're on your way, you join the PTA, you get to know the teachers, you become part
of that community.
And so that's the best thing that you need to do if your loved one is, is thinking about
making a move and so the best, one of the things is try to find a place that's easy
to visit so you can pop in and you can be part of the community.
The second thing that I tell people is, is that I want you to pretend that you're not
shopping for an old folks home, but you're looking for the next college that you're going
to and college kids go on campuses.
They don't care about the square footage of their dorm room.
They look at the other students and that's what you want to do when you look at these
places is that you want to look at the other residents.
You want to look at the faculty or the staff.
And I just remind people it's don't, it's great if you find a beautiful place with
wonderful walls, but it's not about the walls.
It's the people working and living within those walls.
Absolutely.
Yeah, we had many instances where my father was in rehab, senior facilities, different
situations and they aren't all good.
And they're definitely some good and some great people we worked with, but then there
were some not so good.
And I think there's a whole other subject of how to educate families, how to navigate
through these systems and know the right questions to ask and who to talk to and not just take,
I mean, I could tell story after story of crazy adventures.
Probably the funniest story of my dad is just to share one of his antics is he was in the
hospital and he had had stroke, so he had left neglect.
So when he ate, he had a hard time seeing the left side of the plate.
His left arm didn't really work.
So he was in the hospital for something else at Reston Hospital.
And the nurse brought his food and he couldn't find the fork, whatever.
He couldn't find the nursing thing to call the nurse.
He couldn't figure out where it was.
So he got a call from a politician on a cell phone asking to the politician for him, my
dad, to vote for him.
He goes, tell you what, if you call the nursing station on such and such a floor, Reston Hospital,
and send a nurse to my room to help me eat my breakfast, I'll vote for you.
And they did.
Oh, wow.
And he wrote a local paper about it.
That's one of the best stories I've heard.
That is great.
There was a story in the local Reston paper about it thanking the person, but you know,
he was definitely a find a way kind of guy.
And sometimes you have to do that.
So absolutely.
And that's really, I mean, my advice to folks is you got to be the squeaky wheel.
You got to be present in the community.
And one of the things, I mean, the benefit that your dad had with six kids, and, you
know, I can only imagine when he was in the hospital or in other settings, the stream
of visitors that he had.
And this is, it's kind of, you know, the other term that used to be used, not solo aging,
it was elder orphans.
And I, it's such a sad term, but a visit to any nursing home, you will see there are
residents in there that don't have any visitors.
And it's really sad because it's, they're relying on different people to advocate for
them other than their loved ones.
Yeah.
I do a program through Mary Kay where we do an adoptive mom or adopt a grandparent providing
gifts and we've taken gifts to the nursing homes and facilities.
And there's some people, yeah, that never have visitors.
No, they've, you know, they've out, a lot of people have outlived their whole family.
And then there's, there's folks that, you know, maybe they never married and had a family
and they're, and they're remaining family members are as old as they are and they're
all over the country.
It really, it really is tough and we need to, we need to support these folks.
Yeah, we need to build community and be there.
And I know that my water resource class was a tight-knit community.
People knew we had an email list of people that were sick or something happened or we
were there for them.
So I think a big message here is, you know, to build those relationships, those communities,
and those discussions.
I was thinking when you were talking about those questions, you know, those games you
can get now, like cards against humanity, you ask all these questions, we need an aging
question game, like to ask those hard questions, you know, maybe it was a couple drinks in
you.
No, they've got those.
No, they've got those because there's a big movement for advanced directives, meaning
like the whole conversation about, you know, when would you want us to, you know, pull
feeding tubes and things of that nature.
And it is, there are some really creative games out there.
I'll send you a link and you can throw it in.
Yeah, so we'll definitely share your contact information because I think it's a great subject
that we need to talk about more.
And that's one of the reasons I wanted you on here and to be able to share some of your
content, which I'm hoping to do on the website because it's a subject we only talk about
it.
Yeah, so what courage would you or what would you say to somebody to empower somebody to
be courageous?
Oh, man.
Well, you know, I got two kids and these are a lot of the conversations that you have
with your children are centered around this topic, whether we frame it that way or not.
But, you know, I think that it's taking taking a risk and taking a chance as long as it's
healthy and it's, you know, something that is not harming any Friday and each way.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
It's like a healthy and then you first.
Okay.
I think when when you frame it that way, and this is off the top of my head, but it's
sort of like when we take risks and we prepare for them properly, it's like we're entering
a secret passageway.
And when we go through that passageway, we're going to be a different person and we're going
to, we're going to have a new experience that can help us be a better person and help us
share a better share life experience with others.
All right.
I love that definition.
I think that's going to be my new tagline.
I love that.
Yeah.
That and I've had lots of discussions obviously around the courage and doing those things
and they don't have to be big.
They're just those little things and I'm even listened to a podcast the other day about
decluttering and organizing that are totally different.
But the subject, the way she turned it around, which I've shared this many times is like
when you're decluttering, it's like just doing that one thing, you're leaving a situation
better.
And so just doing that little thing, making you better and being courageous and just those
little steps give you courage to do the next thing and the next thing.
And I think he was quoting somebody else, but my good friend, Len Fork, I'm going to
introduce you to, who's climbing Mount Everest right now by the way.
But he shared a statement with me from somebody and its action creates opportunity is that
when we say something like, oh, I'm not ready yet or I'm not going to do this or what have
you or I'm scared, you're missing an opportunity.
You always want to be in action and we always want to be improving ourselves because we
improve the world when we improve ourselves.
Yes, love that.
Thank you.
Yeah, we can talk forever and ever.
We want to want to keep you.
No, no, no, this is great.
So I always at the end kind of tie back to connecting to my dad and people like, why didn't
know your dad?
And you probably ran into my dad at somewhere.
I definitely remember him and and and I, but I didn't realize that all those years that
I was paddleboarding there on Lake Ann, I was basically paddling right in front of his house.
Yes.
So yes, all the connections you're talking about, first of all, community, he was all
about community.
You being on the lake and paddleboarding, he, we lived on the lake and he worked at Lake
Ann.
And he, there weren't paddleboards in the day, but he went with he ice skated, he swam,
he sailed, he windsurfed, canoed, whatever way he made it to work at some point.
And then the other thing he said you did, which is your snowboarding, instructing, and
work with people with disabilities or adaptive.
So my dad asked her, he had a stroke and remember he had an eye patch on from high school.
So it didn't have one eye and then he had a stroke, but we, that's another thing.
I'm legally blind in one eye.
I've been in the way since birth.
He was too, but he had an eye patch.
But he, we went to Blue Knob one time and they had the adaptive ski patrol people taking
them out on the slope and he went and it was so cold.
I don't know if you've ever skied at Blue Knob, it's freezing.
And he came back and his mustache was frozen like solid.
He was frozen, but the smile on his face and the joy that he's like, I got to go skiing.
And even after a stroke, he still went body surfing.
He got a PVC pipe and a, and a, we did put a safety vest, a life jacket on him, which
normal he wouldn't wear, but he went, you know, he did it all when he was older.
You never know.
Why not today?
Yeah.
Why not today?
Exactly.
Well, Steve, thank you so much.
This has been awesome.
And we're going to share the resources.
We're going to have you share links to how to get in touch with you.
Show notes.
And we will have more discussions, I'm sure.
And thanks again.
And I'm looking forward to maybe we'll physically meet sometime for coffee or something.
I'll see you on the bottom somewhere because I'm always around resting.
Oh, and back to other connection.
Your son, I think we mentioned.
He was working at ZX and I was, he said one day his name or you and I'm like, I know
who your dad is.
Never really met him, but all over the world.
He was a great kid.
I love what you're doing too and the concept of this podcast is wonderful.
Well, thank you.
All right.
Well, thanks again and thanks everybody for watching.
You can always check out the podcast on, we're on all the sources.
Three yard.
Now we're on YouTube.
You can see YouTube, iTunes, Google.
We do have a website, why not say podcast.com.
And we do have gear and swag.
If you want a T-shirt or a cup or a vinyl, I'll think in the other day too.
We might be journal to journal those brave courageous things we're doing.
So we're looking to do some fun things and collaborate with other people.
So thanks again for watching and thanks Steve for joining us.
Don't forget, say why not today?