Aging changes what the body can do.  

Kathie Hewko knows that firsthand. A 79-year-old real estate agent, she long marked time with an annual swim beneath the Golden Gate Bridge—until illness forced a reckoning with what it means to keep dreaming when the body no longer cooperates. 

After completing her swim beneath the bridge, "it was very spiritual to me," she says. "I just felt so free." She's shared the water with harbor porpoises, seals, and pelicans—"a good luck symbol for me"—finding not just endurance there, but meaning. 

Eric Greensmith faced a different reckoning. At 17, he was "King of the Beach," a lifeguard on the New Jersey Shore. After forty years as an anesthesiologist, retirement left him staring at a version of himself he barely recognized. Haunted by who he used to be, Eric set an audacious goal: reclaiming a seat on the lifeguard stand—competing against swimmers young enough to be his children. 

In this episode of Young at Heart, Kathie and Eric reflect on injury, illness, aging, and the discipline required to keep going anyway.  

Young at Heart brings you stories of people navigating life's transitions—stories that invite you to imagine what's next. 

For Kathie and Eric, aging didn't close the door—it taught them how to read the water differently.