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Young at Heart June 2021

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HCO# 444700020 600 Frederick Street • Santa Cruz, CA 95062 • (831) 469-4900 • www.lifespancare.com Home Care Personalized care up to 24 hours a day by experienced and registered home care aides. Enhancing life and finding joy through activities that increase engagement, fulfillment, and a sense of connection. Well-Being Program Care management promotes peace of mind through professional, person-centered assessment, coordination of personal care, medical, and social needs. Care Management AGING CARE YOU CAN TRUST SINCE 1983 Best of Senior Home Care In honor of Gay Pride month in June, Lifespan would like to acknowledge our community's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, & Transgender older adults. Your everyday demonstration of strength and resilience is inspiring. Foot and Ankle Issues? Dr. Tea Nguyen enhances patient outcomes with restorative therapies and minimally invasive techniques in our patient centered facility. We Love Treating: • Amputation Prevention • Ankle Pain • Ankle Sprains • Achilles Tendonitis • Bunions • Callus, Corns, Warts • Diabetic Foot Care • Flat Feet in kids & adults • Foot Fractures • Ganglion Cysts • Geriatric Foot Care • Hammertoes • Heel Pain (plantar fasciitis) • Ingrown Toenail • Minimally Invasive Procedures • Mole Removal • Neuropathy, Neuromas • Pediatric Foot Care • Plastic Surgery Techniques • Regenerative Medicine • Scar Removal • Second Opinions • Soft Tissue Disorders • Stress Fractures • Tarsal Tunnel Syndrome • Tendonitis • Toenail Fungus • Wounds Call Today for A Consultation 831-288-3400 243 Green Valley Road, #A, Freedom, CA 95019 831feet.com Social Dancing for solos and couples Peggy Pollard, Teacher Peggy@WaltzTribe.com www.WaltzTribe.com www.PeggyDance.weebly.com Santa Cruz Waltz & Swing online dances & lessons Waltz Tribe membership Grow your mind, body & soul Dance to music you love Sign up Now for up-coming Classes! Irish Nuns and South African Dance Unite the World It's the viral dancing nuns who sucked me in. So there I was, at my desk last week, sinking deeper into despair from daily doses of national news evil, pushed over my mental limit and into a retreat for the safety of my mental cave of peaceful isolation. Then just before I switched my computer off, a You Tube video popped up on the screen. "Nuns at enclosed Dublin monastery perform a viral dance" Huh. Wonder what that's about. My finger hesitated above the mouse button. A clickbait gimmick? Geesh, I really need to get my work done. But … Irish nuns? A viral dance? I frowned at the image on my screen. Elderly robed nuns stood tall in their immaculate hallway . . . I clicked. A bouncy clapping begins. Vocal percus- sions, chanting, and organ chords join in. A deep voice sings "Jerusalema," in Zulu language. The line of nuns begins tapping left feet, then right feet, on the linoleum. They hop, tilt forward, march three steps, turn and waddled sideways. Arms wave in the air. Faces grow rosy with exertion. "It's NOT a gimmick," the video caption assures. "It was purposely done as a prayer" Delighted at the nun's joy, I needed to learn more. Thus began my search that filled my past week with an avalanche of dance videos -- thousands of people around the globe, stepping synchronized to the same melodious rhythms. The silky South African "Jerusalema" song was first released in November 2019. Its video in Decem- ber now has 409 million YouTube views. Two months later some Angolan friends posted a TikTok dance challenge video, now with 16 million views. The nun's video (46K views on YouTube, 16M on Facebook) is among hundreds worldwide. Many call it the "new Macarena." How did I miss this? While I've been overdos- ing my brain this year in negativity this year, a simple dance has been uniting our world in the power of joy. Just a dance! From Tokyo, Japan to Quincy, California, TikTok and Youtube overflow with regiments of Jerusa- lema dancers: uniformed schoolchildren, African park rangers dancing in mud boots with elephants, airline crews in terminals and tarmacs, hospital staff in operating rooms and cancer wards, Kenyan parking police traipsing marbled aisles, beach bikini beauties, full gear firefighters stomping in Pompeii, Italy, Mumbai teachers adding Bolly- wood moves, Mexican folklorico dancers wav- ing floral skirts. This simple haunting choreography has un- leashed an international tsunami of bliss. Everyone is invited-- Lightning-footed South African kids in dusty alleys, fragile oldsters stepping cautiously in kitchens, even people with no legs at all are posting TikTok videos. Edna, age 73, writes "I was very sick when I heard this song, a fire of energy went through my body." Anna, 70's, says "I was feeling low, anxious and despairing when I first… saw all the dance chal- lenges, For the first time in years my heart opened and was filled with love for the beautiful world we live in." Carol, 80, writes" That is so cheering, uplifting. All out of their comfort zones but enjoying it all!" Exactly. The beauty of this dance is precisely its simplicity, and the delight it brings to all manner of people. So yes, YOU too, Young At Heart readers are in- vited. (see below for free online lessons this week) If you can walk, even YOU, dear non-dancing reader, can dance it too. So, what makes THIS dance so globally potent? South African VJ ,"TYHN" explains why this song went viral. It describes what so many of us long for: a sense of belonging, the hope that we have a real home where God resides, where I belong too, a protective presence that is listening and reaching out to help me wherever I am, what- ever troubles I am in. "The Power of the song is . . . hope. . . Whatever has you feeling lost and afraid, it is a plea for guidance and protection with the faith that it shall come." YouTube commenters agree: "That feeling when something makes you so happy and you can't explain why..." "This brought tears to my eyes because music truly unites! All races coming together and enjoying an African song!!!!" [and thousands more comments like these] "This song deserves a global award and recog- nition. It united the entire world." Join the global dance party joy, online, June 19 – 25 Santa Cruz Waltz & Swing Summer Dance Week featuring "Jerusa- lema," and other dance lessons, talks and more. Don't miss it! INFO LINKS: www.peggydance.weebly. com/summer-2021 -- Full DANCE WEEK schedule www.peg- gydance.weebly.com/ event-calendar -- Full Summer Calendar www.peggydance.weebly. com/jerusalema -- More info and links on "Jerusa- lema" By Peggy Pollard, Santa Cruz Waltz & Swing www.PeggyDance.weebly.com The thing about a callus… By Dr. Tea Nguyen, DPM You see thickening of skin on the bottom of your foot or even on your toes. You try different ways to self treat but it doesn't seem to be going away. What could those skin lesions be? The two most common skin lesions of the foot is either a callus, with various presentations, or a wart. Thickening of the skin occurs in areas of high pressure points. It's your body's way of protecting itself by forming a thick layer of hard tissue. If left ignored for too long , these can cause discomfort and pain with each step, stopping you from doing the things you enjoy. Even worse, it can cause the underlying skin to break down creating an open sore, or ulcer, and potentially an infection. It can occur on the bottom of your foot or on the toes especially if there are toe deformities, like a hammertoe that rubs against the shoe. A wart, on the other hand, is caused by a virus that can be contracted from bare- foot walking in communal areas. The virus can spread through direct contact and is often seen on the fingers as well. On close inspec- tion you'll see tiny black dots within the thick tissue, indicating that the wart has hijacked your body and created it's own blood chan- nels to feed itself. Gentle trimming of the callus may reveal pinpoint bleeding that is different from a callus. It is important to get the correct diagnosis before treating. Often I see patients who have tried treating a callus with a wart medi- cation or they treat a wart with a product that damages healthy skin. Calluses are treated with a better shoe fit, custom orthotics that specifically take the pressure off that particular area, nonsteroidal injections like a foot filler can aid in decreasing pain and lastly surgery may be indicated in severe cases. Minimally invasive surgery is my preferred technique to keep patients active while decreasing the morbidity of traditional open surgery. Warts can be treated with freezing, off label use of cantharidin, microwave therapy, needling or surgical removal. The most import- ant part of treatment is con- sistency in the therapy and prevention so it does not recur. It is also important to treat the entire household to prevent it from spread- ing. If there is an unusual growth on your feet, get it evaluated immediately. The longer you wait, the more difficult treatments can be. We happily are accepting new patients. Call to sched- ule at 831-288-3400.

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