After eight decades of receiving Christmas gifts, the last thing Mel Brown of Castle Rock wanted was another bathrobe. Or heaven forbid, an Xbox. His daughter, Bev Marsh of Aurora, knew what would happen to just about anything she might buy for him.
“More than likely it's just going to sit in a box,” she said.
So last year, Marsh and her daughter Madelyn came up with a new gift idea for Brown: a different outing, every month, for a year. They brainstormed some ideas and Madelyn put together a calendar and framed it.
“That was something that he was able to put up in his house to get excited about every month, knowing what was to come. And so that was what he actually opened on Christmas morning last year,” Marsh said.
Their one rule: it’s not just lunch.
“I mean, a lunch date sometimes is a great gift,” said Marsh, a realtor. But she and Madelyn wanted to think up new experiences, and “change it up a little bit.” They agreed to alternate, and sometimes go together, taking Brown for monthly new adventures.
In January, for their first outing, Marsh and her dad headed to Wings Over the Rockies, a flight museum in Denver’s Lowry neighborhood. Brown has a family connection to Lowry, which was formerly an Air Force base: his uncle was once stationed there. Brown himself served as an air traffic controller during his enlistment in the Air Force, but he had never been to the museum.
“It was amazing,” said Brown. “Believe it or not, I'd never seen a B1 before. So it was amazing to get in there and be in the shadow of something of that magnitude.”
The next month’s activity was a bit different: pedicures. His granddaughter took him to her favorite nail salon in Parker.
“She introduced him to all the gals that have been working there for 15 years, and they just embraced him the way they do my daughter,” Marsh said. “And he loved it.”
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Marsh said her daughter, who is 22 and a senior at Colorado State University, is happy to travel to the Denver metro area for an outing with her grandfather, with whom she’s always been close.
Mel Brown went for a pedicure with his granddaughter as part of his “outing a month” Christmas present. Courtesy Bev Marsh
Brown agreed that he and his granddaughter are close. Did the pedicure and other outings bring them closer?
“Honestly, to put it the way I feel: no change,” Brown said. “It's no change because of the amount of love that's there to begin with.”
Brown, who is now 86, says he’s pretty open to new experiences and likes to be active. When he found himself widowed and retired about 20 years ago, he decided to hit the road.
“I said, what I'm going to do is, I am going to go out and buy me a trailer, and buy me a truck, and see what's going on in the world,” he said. Soon, he found himself managing federal campgrounds. While he’s now left that line of work, he’s picked up hobbies like amateur radio and genealogy.
| This story is a part of Aging Matters, a series from Colorado Matters about the Centennial State's aging population. Read more stories here. |
Those types of activities - and maybe a pedicure with a loved one - could help older people fend off social isolation and even depression, according to Aga Burzynska, director of the BRAiN Laboratory at Colorado State University. While the focus of her research is how exercise helps the aging brain, she also believes that it's healthy to simply try new things, especially with loved ones.
“I think the motivation, the excitement, and maybe even the serotonin and dopamine we get from it can motivate us to take more out of life,” Burzynska said.
The Marsh-Brown family has been for massages, played at Top Golf, and seen a movie together. Next on the agenda: a performance of the Nutcracker, a holiday favorite. Although he’s always open to new things, Brown grimaced a bit at the prospect of attending the ballet.
“You got me,” he said. “That wouldn't have been one of my first choices to go, but I know what's behind it and it's all positive.”
