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Finding new ways to work and play (cont.) Another kind of job For many seniors, a paying job isn’t the only way to work. Many serve instead as volunteers, making up the biggest percentage of helpers at many non-profit groups and organizations. In fact, one-third of all adults over age 65 give their time to help others. Ida Notov, of Squirrel Hill, joined the volunteer ranks in 1967, after being a full-time mother to two daughters and taking care of her husband until his death that year. Since then, she has volunteered in as many as seven hospitals a week. At 90, she relies on county transportation to take her to the five hospitals she’s still active in. She has particularly strong ties to the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, where she has spent one day a week without fail for the past 15 years, putting in more than 3,300 hours visiting people in the in-patient geriatric unit. "It’s my pillar of strength," said Notov, who has never been hospitalized. "By the time I get out of the hospitals, I’m the richest lady in the world." Notov also has won several awards for her work, including the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program’s Volunteer of the Year award in 1993. A national organization, RSVP matches almost 950 local volunteers with nonprofit institutions and organizations. While the numbers haven’t changed recently, the goals of many volunteers have, said Marlene Urso, field coordinator for RSVP. "We’re getting more people who want to do something more challenging," Urso said. "They want to really make a difference." One national group that eases the transition from work to volunteering is the National Retiree Volunteer Coalition, which helps companies organize volunteer groups for their retirees. Mellon Bank is one of five local businesses that has worked with the coalition. The resulting Mellon Volunteer Professionals took on 298 projects last year involving 1,507 volunteers, said spokeswoman Kathy Carohak. The bank donates space and minimal funding, but the volunteers organize themselves, said their current president, Martha Catizone. Retirees join the program to give back to the community as well as for its social benefits, she said. "We learned that it’s a unique way of keeping in touch with people we have worked with formerly, and whose company we enjoyed," Catizone said. Though there are many other national or business volunteer organizations, most volunteering is informal or community-based. Older people might spend much of their time baby-sitting for grandchildren and helping friends.
Helen and Leo Golembeski’s neighbors in Polish Hill call them for emergency rides to a doctor or hospital at all hours, although they now spend most of their volunteer time working with the Lawrenceville Meals on Wheels. The organization is backed by the Lutheran Service Society, but the Golembeskis first learned about it through their Catholic church. Helen, 75, has worked at least once a week for the past 21 years. Leo, 76, joined his wife on his days off and has worked regularly since he retired from U.S. Steel 16 years ago. Every Tuesday morning, they load 17 hot meals and 17 brown bag lunches into their Cadillac. When they visit the homes of the frail elderly, it’s not just hot vittles they’re serving. "Sometimes, we’re the only people that they talk to," Leo said. "Some are cranky, but …we make them laugh before we leave." The Golembeskis are two of the 3,643 volunteers who operate the 64 Meals on Wheels in Allegheny County. Seventy-seven percent of their volunteers are older than 75. Different ways of giving Senior citizens volunteer in different ways depending on their ages, according to Keith Kondrich, director of Good Neighbors, a United Way volunteer placement agency. "A lot of national trends are pointing in the direction of recently retired people who would like to use the skills and talents they gained in a work career in a volunteer situation," Kondrich said. While younger retirees may be most drawn by the kind of activities they would perform as volunteers, older senior citizens gravitate to the communities and institutions they know and trust.
Generational studies have shown that the older elderly also stand by their local religious organizations. "That generation has a loyalty to the church, and they have a sense of giving," said Elly Fleming, assistant director of pastoral care at Presbyterian Seniorcare at Oakmont. "They are of the era where they know about stewardship in the church. That’s their tradition. They’re of the generation that knows something about sacrifice … They can hold forth a vision of the church in strength at a time when our churches are losing members." Those values are ones that clergy need to recognize as they interact with increasingly older congregations, she said. "I think seminaries are not fully aware of this fact, and ministers come out of seminaries thinking they’re going to serve a church of 30 and 40 year olds," Fleming said. "They are not really trained in how to … minister with [older congregants] and not to them." Clergy have long debated ways of dealing with the graying of the church. Years ago, Catholic churches opened aging offices, prepared books, and sponsored workshops on ministering to the elderly, said the Rev. Dave Bonner, rector of St. Paul Seminary in Crafton. Christianity will not die out with the older generation, said Gary McIntosh, a church consultant from California who wrote "Three Generations: Riding the Waves of Change in Your Church." In spite of growing distractions such as television, he said the population that attends church has not shifted substantially in the last 50 years. What has changed, McIntosh said, is that younger generations are moving out of their local parishes and into newer, larger congregations that can offer them more, such as the 20,000-member Willow Creek Community Church outside of Chicago. Older adults may be the only people willing to remain in smaller, local parishes, he said. The Jewish community "has been wonderfully stable," said Rabbi Stephen Steindel, chair of the Pittsburgh Rabbinic group. Although one-third of the Jewish religious community is over the age of 60, "There is a very positive balance. One of the uniquenesses of Squirrel Hill is that you’ve got children and grandchildren living on the same block as their grandparents." "As long as we’re able to attract and keep the middle generation and the younger generation there won’t be a crisis," Steindel said.
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