One of the signs of passing youth is the birth of a sense of fellowship with other human beings as we take our place among them.
Virginia Woolf

(Well, that and the realization that Mick Jagger will be sixty-four later this month ... and looks more like Barney Fife in spandex every year ... when it's so easy to recall him, and Keith Richards, being cute young things.)

Brian May, the 59-year-old composer and founder of Queen with Freddie Mercury, et al, recently completed the PhD in astrophysics that he let drop more than thirty years ago. He's planning to do some good work now.

Reading about his accomplishment inspired me to look into others we Boomers might be pulling now that our truly strenuous Rock and Roll years are behind us, and we're settling in to "living with other human beings as we take our place among them."

There are so many ways to contribute, and it feels even more important to be actively creating a better world when we have children so young ... kids who will be around to reap benefits, or not, perhaps directly because of us.

Like Thomas Jefferson, who said, "Too old to plant trees for my own gratification, I shall do it for my posterity", our tree-appreciating posterity is looking us right in the eye.

One discovery I made while tracking Boomers making a difference is The Purpose Prize and its contenders.

Described as the prize "for Americans leading with experience", it's for people sixty and over who are changing the world for the better and awards $100,000 to five people ... and $10,000 to ten ... who are "taking on society's biggest challenges".

Among this year's finalists:

Gloria Jackson Bacon, founder of Project 18, a Chicago area health service working to build healthy families to help children thrive.

Phil Borges, creator of Bridges to Understanding, a project designed to expand children's world view and cultural knowledge and get kids talking to and understanding each other.

Jose-Pablo Fernandez created a program to teach computer technology in Spanish to parents, equipping them with marketable computer skills and helping them learn strategies to encourage their kids to stay in school and go on to college.

Gordon Johnson developed, Neighbor to Family, a program that works to prevent the separation of siblings in foster care.

Sharon Rohrback, a former neo-natal nurse in St. Louis who set up the Nurses for Newborns Foundation that brings experienced nurses into the homes of mothers who may be, for many reasons, considered high risk. "It's a low-cost, high-impact way to reduce infant mortality, prevent child abuse and neglect, strengthen families, and reduce costs to society. "

Good luck to all of these folks, and the other ten, as well, who have contributed so much to the world.

Not up for any awards, but nonetheless inspirational:

How about Gene Glasscock, a 67-year-old who rode his horse through 48 states ... a trip of over 20,000 miles that took him three years ... to raise money for children in Paraguay?

Or for sheer strength, Lucille Borgen, a polio and cancer survivor, who won the National Water Ski title on her 91st birthday.