More 100-year-olds are alive today than at any other time in history, over 70,000 in the U.S. Contrary to stereotypes, at least 25 percent of them are active, healthy, and engaged with the world around them.NPR producer Neenah Ellis spent a year traveling across America, meeting centenarians, sitting with them, and listening for as long as they wanted to talk--in some cases, days. Her profiles aired in a monthly series on NPR's Morning EditionĀ® in the year 2000. They enlightened listeners about what it means to be 100--and they changed Ellis's life.
If I Lived to Be 100 is Ellis's story of her experience and what it meant to her on a deeply personal level. We meet the people she met in her journeys, get to know them, and share their insights, memories, wisdom, and common sense. Meanwhile, we come to realize what Ellis herself did: that we can choose our own futures. We can decide what sort of old people we want to be.
Our audio version of If I Lived to Be 100 is Ellis's book and more, with excerpts from her radio series. The power of Ellis's experience is in the voices of the centenarians who taught her so much.