Have you had a memento mori, a reminder of death, an OMG-I'm-gonna-die-one-day moment? Or perhaps a memento senesci, and OMG-I'm-gonna-be-old-one-day moment? This can happen at any age, and is just as authentic when a very young person feels it. Sometimes it prompts us to change or die.

This podcast episode is a chat with Simon Sweetman, a writer, music afficionado and podcaster who knows far too much about popular music. He talks about waking up to his own mortality, making big changes in his life to prevent an early death, and some favourite songs that are (sort of) about old age.

Simon Sweetman got a brutal wake-up call around the age of 40. After that turning point he began making a few big changes in his life, one at a time. He tells us what changed after a nurse spoke to him bluntly at a crossroads in his life.

Simon and I also talk about changes in our thinking and our approach to life, changes that happen almost inevitably in the process of growing older.

In this podcast episode, Kate Camp and I go nitpicking, grumbling and enthusing on the general topic of old people reading books and old people in books. Listen if you might be old one day. Because everything changes as you get older, including your reading habits.

My guest Kate Camp is a terrific poet and in New Zealand she’s well known and very popular because of a radio programme, Kate’s Klassics. Every month she used to re-read a classic book, like Anne of Green Gables or Pride and Prejudice or The Odyssey, and on Radio NZ she would do a wickedly funny commentary on that book.

That's why I’ve asked Kate here to talk about reading. How reading may change as we get older. What we read, how we read, why we read, why we don’t read — and books that feature old people as protagonists. That sounds quite organised, doesn’t it? Well, it’s not. We wander all over the place, but always with a special interest in old people reading. Listen up for Kate's origin myth of how she learned to read. We react in personal ways to Read NZ's 2025 National Reading Survey. We cast about for very old protagonists in novels, and skip lightly over the current wave of book series set in retirement villages. We rave about a TV series and a couple of books that feature characters confronting their own old age.

Kate is wonderfully blunt at times. For instance, "In DIckens there's a lot of old people but they're all decrepit old wrecks." "Subconsciously people think if you're reading a book it's more worthy than watching TV."

Thanks for listening — catch you later! And if you like this podcast, please tell a friend.

Learning How To Be Old returns to the air with a timely check-up. I want to be sure that I'm fit to podcast. Hugo, aged 13, tests me for my overdue Old Person Warrant of Fitness. Looking pretty good, though some criteria are dubious. I just need an oil and grease and a few tweaks to allow for some common age-related changes.

In coming episodes, my terrific guests bring a breath of fresh air as we chat about issues in daily life. Obviously, your body and mind keep changing from the day you're born, and it never stops. As a result, so does your social life, your mental life, the pressures you feel, your habits and your choices.

Exploring so many topics related to old age takes mental and physical agility. Last week disaster struck when I accidentally wiped out a conversation with a brilliant, busy guest. That was a big fail, and all my own doing. I felt so ashamed. I hope I've learned a necessary lesson about focus and thumbs.

For an hour or two, I doubted myself. Am I really fit to podcast? Next year's test will be more rigorous. Meantime, enjoy listening to my guest Hugo as he puts me through my paces.

From now on, Learning How To Be Old will be broadcast from Wellington Access Radio at 6:30 pm, alternate Tuesdays. Also here on my website and on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, etc. as usual.

Thanks for listening! And please share with somebody you know.

I started by naming a podcast, as you do. Some experts tell you not to overthink when naming a podcast. So instead, I underthought.

"Learning How To Be Old" is a terrifying title. It drives people away in droves, screaming and blocking their ears. So, bad name for a podcast! (You would rather be dead than old, true?) So why do I carry on? Mainly for fun: I find the whole creative process entrancing, and I just love coaxing my guests to speak their minds.

If you find the prospect of old age scary, you're not alone. In my defence, I want show old age as a chunk of your real life — not a slab of nothingness. Many good things follow, like relief and purpose and self-esteem and — so much more fun!

In regular episodes, amazing guests, young and old, teach me something about how to live. (Hence my foolish naming of this podcast.) "Bonus" episodes are just me, thinking out loud about some aspect of my creative life, my personal artist's way.

Deciding to be happy? My podcast guest 81-year-old Dale Copeland does just that. She's an assemblage artist, theoretical mathematician, maker of books, webmaster since 1997, writer, community art curator, and Taekwon-Do Master.

According to Dale, happiness is not an accident, nothing to do with good luck. It’s a rational, purposeful choice. Good idea to listen to this episode, because you might be old one day like Dale and me.

This episode is packed with little gems, from elephant jokes to tips on self defence for little old ladies. Listen how she plays down some momentous achievement of hers, like, when her instructor says, “Dale, there isn’t a book about the history of Chang Hon Taekwon-Do. Why don’t you write one?" She replies, "Yes sir!” Or she tells you that her website exhibiting public art was apparently the first, or that she ran an international collage exchange for 20 years or that her grandmother wore a piece of pink flannel round her waist to keep out the cold.

Yes, this is the last episode of the current season of Learning How To Be Old. I'm proud of this year's episodes. I'll be back! But it's good to have a break, do some other stuff, and make sure the next batch of episodes is well seasoned and well cooked. (I'm already excited.)

Meantime, thank you for listening. I know your time is precious. I hope you've been picking up some tips on how to be old. Your personal vision of old age tends to come true for you, did you know that? So remember Dale's story — 81 can be fun!

Introducing two remarkable women who are happily still working at 77. Liz Melchior's career has come full circle: she's back in the classroom, teaching primary school children after 20 years teaching adults. Helen Moulder continues to tour plays around New Zealand, including those featuring her much-loved comic character, Miss Cynthia Fortitude, the deluded opera singer. We chat, and I pick up some good tips on how they manage their stamina and work-life balance. Expect nothing, but be open to opportunities. Lots of joy and common sense in this episode!

Have you started thinking about retirement? That's an odd word, now that our work patterns are so different from the job-for-life model of the olden days. Those working at 77 are more visible these days. But sadly, in New Zealand the majority keep working out of necessity, because of the high cost of living. Liz and Helen feel lucky because they have opportunities to do work that they love, and work that can be tailored to their needs as they age. They don't take it for granted, either.

We're now into Season 3 of Learning How To Be Old. (Season 1 had a different name and may not be findable now.) If you click "Follow" when you're listening, you'll find out whenever a new episode is broadcast.

You may notice that the sound quality is lower than in other recent episodes. My bad! I was still using my first microphone, and learning on the job. But they are wonderful interviews, regardless.

Thanks for listening! I wouldn't be doing this otherwise.

Are your parents ready for downsizing in later life? That's when it hits us. One day it could be our turn. My brain knows it's quite likely going to happen to me one day. That's something I find very hard to imagine and so I'm in denial for now.

All the more reason to learn about the process. So I asked two people to tell me about it, both of whom are masters of downsizing in later life.

First I met with Judy McCallum, co-owner of Taskmasters, a company of organisers who operate in the North Island of Aotearoa, in the Bay of Plenty, and in Wellington, Wairarapa, and Kapiti. The staff of Taskmasters are all over 50, and have all seen their parents downsizing — so they have a very personal understanding of what it means to move house in later life. It's highly emotional stuff!

Then I talked to Lindsay McCallum, who moved multiple times as a child and as a family man. He has worked out some highly efficient ways of managing moves, and has some great tips. The last time he moved, he was aged 90, and this time, he worked with Taskmasters to make it ultra-simple, in fact, almost painless.

As always, we’re kind of accidentally practising all our lives for transition into old age and very old age. Helping your parents is like a rehearsal for that future event. I'll stack these tips on downsizing in my old age away in the back of my brain for the day when I can't manage the stairs in my apartment.

Please enjoy the brilliant insights of my two guests, and a poem about my experience of moving over and over again when I was a child, one of six sisters.

This podcast episode is all about a lesson in falling safely, especially in old age. You heard that right. Not preventing falls — which is crucial, but there’s already plenty of information and training available for preventing falls.

No, this is about learning how to fall as safely as possible with minimal damage to our body and brain. Because sometimes everyone falls over. We trip, slip, tumble and lose our balance – especially in old age. And when you’re old, the consequences are usually more drastic than when you’re young and bouncy.

So I called on Simon Manns, a stage fight director, to start training me to fall safely. Simon directs fight scenes for stage productions, which means he trains opera singers, dancers, circus performers and actors to fight realistically and safely on stage. As he says, they have to do their stage fight — and most likely fall over — five times a week and twice on Sunday, without hurting themselves.

Listen as Simon talks about falling safely and start training me, step by step, starting on all fours. He explains and directs. I say "Whoosh!" and "Oops!"

Would you like to train your body to fall as safely as possible? In June 2025, Simon will run a pilot 6-session course on falling safely — in a room with crash mats, in Wellington, New Zealand. Numbers are limited (for safety, of course!) so if you are interested, please contact me or Simon by email:

rachel writing dot co dot nz or simon.swordplay gmail.com

Mindful habits help you to stay calm. Bring you back to reality when you feel confused. Fantastic now, crucial in old age. Listen if you might be old one day!

Welcome back to Learning How To Be Old, with me, Rachel McAlpine.

I’m 85, and with hindsight comes this insight. All our lives we’re accumulating habits that are going to have an impact on our future old age. Mindful habits will be exceptionally useful: the tiny habit of taking a moment to be mindful. They’ll help you every day. Especially if you’re always searching for your phone or compulsively checking things or getting anxious.

Today my guest is Kerene Strochnetter, a workplace mindfulness consultant based in Wellington. She works with leaders and leadership teams, "helping them ditch the corporate mask and lead with heart (without losing their edge)." And you know what? What’s good for the CEO (mindful habits) is also good for you and me, at any age — even more so in old age. And even CEOs will be old one day, if they’re lucky.

In this episode you’ll get the gist of mindfulness not as an airy-fairy theory but as a practice, a daily routine, a set of simple habits of your own choice. Things you can do in half a minute, any time, on the spot. (Expect some odd anecdotes and noises in the mix. Some are intentional.)

We can learn a lot about how to grow old from aging the Māori way. Welcome back to this podcast, Learning How To Be Old. Listen if you might be old one day ... even if you don’t believe that will ever happen.

Today’s guest — and a fount of precious knowledge — is Grace Hoete. She is Senior Arts Advisor for the Wellington City Council and the manager of Toi Poneke. But I got to know Grace as an actor. In my last play, The Secret Lives of Extremely Old People, she played a 93-year-old Māori writer called Puti. Like all 5 characters in the play, Puti is an imaginary character but she speaks a true story based on the words and stories of people who were children in the 1930s. And that makes them different from you and me.

Grace has known very old people who share many of Puti's life experiences, and she tells us a great deal about aging the Māori way. It’s fitting that she should share this knowledge in a podcast, with her glorious voice, and not in writing — because the Māori way of passing on knowledge is also oral.

The podcast ends with a very old song in te reo, He Puti Puti Pai. The words were written in 1926 by Sir Apirana Ngati, and the Turakina Māori Girls College Choir recorded the song in 1978, as far as I can tell. Thanks to Viking Sevenseas for permission to share it in this episode about aging the Māori way.

Auckland: from 2–6 April 2025 you can see The Secret Lives of Extremely Old People at the Dolphin Theatre in Onehunga. I’ll be there on the last afternoon for a Q&A session. Come along, do!

Timaru: from 9–16 May the South Canterbury Drama League is showing the play, and I’ll be there on the 14th and 15th. Maybe we’ll meet: please introduce yourself!