Young and Old

"I often reflected on the needs that the old and the young have for each other as I sat on a bench outside the stucco house with Angel Modesto. His great-grandson, Luis Fernando, not yet two, usually was at his side. They seemed sewn from the same bolt of cloth. They walked at the same pace, with the gait of kinship. They had time and love and attention for each other. For long stretches, I would watch the tireless Luis Fernando romping and running and laughing, testing his legs and his arms and his place in the world, and daily growing more secure in the knowledge that the loving eyes of his great-grandfather countenanced with enormous approbation his every move. Each was aware of the other and shared their love with an unaffected ease. I felt having his great-grandfather in his life was as important for Luis Fernando's sense of well-being, now and in his future, as his having nursed from his mother's breast."

Those lovely words are from the pen of the late Grace Halsell, journalist and anthropologist, from her book Los Viejos (The Old Ones) written after spending two years in the 1970's with the people of Vilcabamba, a village in the Andes mountains of Ecuador. The Vilcabambas are one of three people groups that have been studied in recent decades because of their long life spans (the other two being the Abkhasians of southern Russia and the (better known) Hunzas of southern Pakistan.

All three groups are described by John Robbins in his most recent book Healthy at 100. I have never read anything of John Robbins that was not interesting, compelling, well-researched and thoroughly documented. (His other books include Diet for a New America, The Food Revolution, and Reclaiming Our Health.)

His descriptions of the values of these three people groups are moving, to say the least. They have been studied by lots of scientists and anthropologists, and Robbins has done a great job of culling this research for the best insights about their values, diets, and lifestyles. The quote above is typically descriptive of the gentle, intragenerational ways of these people. The contrast with our Western lifestyles is at once stark, discouraging, and embarrassing.

You'll probably read more quotes from this book in the days ahead as I make my way through it, but wanted to recommend it after just the first few chapters.