![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/JoyousLongevityBookCover-683x1024.jpg\")
<\/p>\nSieglinde Othmer woke up and she was 80. Her husband was dead, buried across the lake from their Parkville home. Her children lived far away.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow was I going to be joyful?\u201d she asked herself.<\/p>\n
Othmer, who has a Ph.D. in social sciences from the University of Hamburg in her native Germany, had worked alongside her husband of 55 years till the day he died. Every moment of her life had been tied to him and to their children.<\/p>\n
Just as she regained a little bounce in her step and some independence after losing him, the world shut down for Covid. By then, though, she\u2019d decided to write a book\u2014a guide, really\u2014telling others how to wear their advanced agae as a badge of honor, and wear it joyfully.<\/p>\n
Kansas City magazine caught up with Othmer, who is now 84, to learn more about the author before her July book talk at Kansas City Public Library\u2019s Waldo branch.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cKicking ass\u201d comes up several times in your book. What does that mean to you?<\/strong> It means writing another book. It means going to Vegas like I did last weekend to see my son. Going on a cruise. Listening to the news and dealing with it. That\u2019s kicking ass. And thinking, \u201cHow can this be a blessing?\u201d That\u2019s kicking ass. Not losing it in despair\u2014that\u2019s definitely kicking ass. Thank you for asking.<\/p>\n Under \u201cJ for Joy,\u201d you wrote that \u201cGratitude and fear do not live in the same heart.\u201d Do you feel fear? How do you deal with that?<\/strong> You read my book! Yes, it attacks us all, and it attacks me every day. In the U.S., we have it so good\u2014most of us. But every morning I wake up and there\u2019s this anxiety about life. Or when you wake up in the night, you get doubts, and the tape in your head goes, \u201cWhat if? What if the book flops?\u201d<\/p>\n I fight that with gratitude. Think about three things that I\u2019m grateful for. Then I think about things that gave me joy in the past. What gives me joy in the next five minutes? Then I think about how I could help people with those three things. I think that\u2019s essential to stepping back into a positive way of living.<\/p>\n Tell me about the merits of walking\u2014that\u2019s under \u201cM for Movement.\u201d<\/strong> I love walking. It\u2019s free and it gets you out of the house. I use walking for a kind of meditation. I use it to satisfy my physical therapist. I use it for talking to my neighbors. I know all the dogs in the neighborhood. I use walking for catching ideas. You have ideas when you walk that you don\u2019t have sitting in the house. I do it every day, rain or shine\u2014but no ice. It\u2019s number one for joyous longevity.<\/p>\n You write about socializing. How can that help save our lives?<\/strong> We feel connected. We exchange ideas. We are not lonely. Isolation is one of the deadly diseases. To connect is wonderful, and I\u2019ve learned that a lot since my husband died and my kids are away. I realized just a couple days ago, the English language doesn\u2019t separate between formal and informal like Spanish, Italian, German and certainly Greek. The English language doesn\u2019t do that, and I think that\u2019s lovely. If you think about attitudes, how they get shaped by your language\u2014when you\u2019re German, it\u2019s so deeply ingrained; you wouldn\u2019t dare call anyone by their first name unless you\u2019re really family.<\/p>\n You mean that English\u2019s lack of that formality shortens the space between us?<\/strong> Yes.<\/p>\n I gather from your book that you don\u2019t quite like the idea of retiring to a beach and drinking margaritas.<\/strong> It\u2019s nice for two weeks. I think we should get active. Volunteer. \u201cP for Purpose.\u201d That\u2019s the key to longevity, and it can be anything.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n GO: Sieglinde Othmer talks about her book, Joyous Longevity: The A-Z Field Guide<\/a>, 2 pm, July 27, Kansas City Public Library, Waldo Branch<\/a> (201 E. 75th St., KCMO<\/a>). RSVP for the free event at kclibrary.org\/events<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sieglinde Othmer woke up and she was 80. Her husband was dead, buried across the lake from their…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":41753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[32914,3601,32915,32916,32917,1022,171,1815,32918,32919,32920,32921,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-41752","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-headsup","9":"tag-author","10":"tag-author-q-and-a","11":"tag-author-talk","12":"tag-book-talk","13":"tag-books","14":"tag-entertainment","15":"tag-interview","16":"tag-kansas-city-public-library","17":"tag-kcmo","18":"tag-local-author","19":"tag-qa","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114802836548445168","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}