[originaltext]It’s a Matter of AttitudeA: Until I was 100 years old, I hadn’t

It’s a Matter of Attitude
A: Until I was 100 years old, I hadn’t really lived. All these interesting things have happened to me since I was 100 years old.
B: Tell me what’s happened since you were 100.
A: Well, for one thing, I rode on the -- I had a blimp ride.
B: The Goodyear blimp.
A: The Goodyear blimp. Oh, he took me out so I could see Catalina. A very, very beautiful trip. Oh, and I’re had helicopter trips, a lot of them, over Burbank, and once he took me so close to the Hollywood sign that I could almost touch it.
B: Now, you’re been alive over a century. You have seen a lot of changes...
A: Everything.
B: You were born what year?
A: I was born January 30, 1885, in a small village about 70 miles south of Chicago.
B: All right. Now, you for your 100th birthday and your 102nd and your 104th went in a helicopter and a blimp. Your 106th birthday, what do you want to do for your 106th?
A: Oh, I want to meet a superstar.
B: I hope you do. All right. As I said, we have people here who are breaking the stereotypes that getting old means sitting around doing nothing and waiting to die. Mary Ann, you are over 100 and you have gone through quite a change in the last several years, in terms of how you looked at aging and how you look at it now.
A: Well, I think my whole attitude about aging has changed. I think the older I got the more comfortable I was with myself and the happier I was. I found that as I got older I no longer ran scared anymore. It’s sort of kind of go your best shot, you know, what can you do to me now? It’s all been done to me. All that can happen now is really more of the same. So I just don’t have that fear anymore.
B: Now, a lot of people think that part of aging is that we don’t get to do the things that we could do, we become inactive, we sit around, we watch television, we crochet, but we can’t go out and have fun anymore. You disprove that all the time.
A: Oh, I think people are very foolish to have that kind of attitude. We all can make choices, and it’s up to us when we get older to decide what choice we’re going to make. And it’s a matter of attitude. If you at my age I say that any morning that I wake up and I’m still alive, it’s a wonderful morning.
B: All right. Now, you do not look your age at all. Not only that, here a lot of other men might be sitting around and watching TV or playing cards all day long, You’re pressing your weight, your own weight? And incredibly active. Did you age gracefully? Did you think that when you got older you d be active? Or did you have to psych yourself up and say, "Wait a minute, I don’t want to get old?"
A: I think I had to psych myself up. And I agree with them in all their remarks, too. You know, young people are afraid to even say the word old. Well, they should read Browning, you know. The best is yet to come.
B: Tell me what’s great about it.
A: Well, I have a chance to do the things that I didn’t do when I was working and supporting my family. And a lot of people say, well, you can’t do them. Well, I can. I’m going to school. I’m very active in my community. We go on vacation to Washington, Hawaii and all that. I mean, r m enjoying life and I’m very active.