I’m with Barbra Streisand – the fun really begins when you’re older, much older

In a recent interview Streisand, aged 81, said she wanted to have more fun in life – and why not, asks comedy writer Jan Etherington who has found whether it’s wild swimming to wilder partying, that the good times really roll the older you get

Growing old disgracefully: just because you’re older, there’s no need for the good times to end (PA/Getty/Netflix)

A rather reflective Barbra Streisand has just revealed, “I haven’t had much fun in my life… I want to have more fun. I want to get into my husband’s truck and just wander…”

Are you thinking what I’m thinking? “A truck? Really, Barb, at 81? You could put your back out! Don’t you have to climb up into those?”

But as someone whose life is mostly spent in luxury limos, maybe what she’s really trying to say is the same as what a large number of my fellow senior railcard holders are feeling too: the good times aren’t over. Because age doesn’t stop us from chasing after them; if anything, it spurs us on to have even more fun than before.

Full disclosure – I’m not that keen on the word “fun” per se. It conjures up holiday camps, shiny-floored game shows, and the whirr of a revolving bowtie. “Isn’t this fun?” makes me respond with all the unbridled, thigh-slapping glee of an Easter Island statue.

I prefer the word “joy,” and in later life – good health permitting – many of us have found a new, more exhilarating joy than we ever had when we were younger. And those who are actively growing older entertainingly, are showing the rest of us the way.

It’s surely no coincidence that the latest buzzy film on Netflix is NYAD. the extraordinary true story of Diana Nyad, who, aged 60, declared she would complete the 110-mile sea swim from Cuba to Key West, something she failed to do when she was 28. It doesn’t sound like fun at all, but I challenge you to watch that film and not revel in the joy of Annette Bening, playing the gung-ho Nyad, being cheered on by her feisty best mate/coach (Jodie Foster). Especially when she defies all expectations and (plot reveal!) does what nobody has ever done on her fifth attempt, aged 64.

“When I walk on that shore in Florida, I want millions of those [retirees] to look at me and say ‘It’s not too late, I can still live my dreams.’” she declares in a typical rousing speech. She is living proof that age should never be a barrier to goals. “For each of us, isn’t life about determining your own finish line?”

Miriam Margolyes has shown that ageing shouldn’t stop you being cheeky (Screengrab / ITV)

The term “growing old disgracefully” is often attributed to the actress Bette Davis, but it was also summed up in the poem Warning written by Jenny Joseph in 1961. It’s the statement of a woman who plans to be chaotic and unconventional in old age – literally, in purple prose. It spawned the Red Hat Society – a self-styled “playgroup for women” where members disport, friskily. I have no doubt they have a lot of fun.

The poet decides that when she is old, she will wear purple, sit down on the pavement when she’s tired, gobble up samples in shops, and press alarm bells. She will also run a stick along the public railings, wear terrible shirts, grow fatter – and “eat three pounds of sausages at a go”.

Is that fun – or just an annoying old bat you’d cross the street to avoid?

Instead, let us look to Miriam Margolyes as the queen of the shock OAP, epitomising the desire to “grow old disgracefully”. But she’s much smarter than that. Hilariously potty-mouthed, Miriam’s short YouTube clip on the contents of her handbag is sublime. She has found her own fun – and we laugh with her, not at her.

Science tells us that life follows the “happiness curve” – a sort of U-bend in which you are stuck at the bottom of between 40-60, but after that start climbing upwards. Is that because you have fewer worries? It’s easier to embrace the fun times if you are healthy, loved, and have a couple of Isas, but a long life travels down a long and winding road, so not all of it is soundtracked by gales of laughter. Staying “up” is sometimes hard, but surrounding yourself with positive people is essential.

Older women often bear the brunt of family crises and heartbreak, and if you look at the way they are portrayed in the media, you would think none of them knew what fun even meant. Women over 60 are shown either in a coma or a care home (often, both); as a tetchy ex-wife, a thin-lipped bodycon dressed “head of the family business”, or a ditsy, aproned nana who has no idea how technology works.

Comedy writer Etherington with Roger Allam and Joanna Lumley who star in ‘Conversations from a Long Marriage’ (Jan Etherington)

Few are portrayed as the happy, sexy, funny older people I know. This is why I decided to write a comedy series about a couple who were growing older but with a joyful, optimistic, and yes, passionate view of life. For Conversations from a Long Marriage, starring Joanna Lumley and the velvet-voiced Roger Allam, playing her husband of 40 years, I admit I drew from my own life and friends. I wrote it for the woman who I believed epitomised that blueprint for a happy later life – who better than Lumley? It launched five years ago and immediately chimed with Radio 4 listeners, which showed there was a place for a comedy about a couple in their seventies who still enjoy music, wine, life – and yes, each other.

At the moment, my life is joyful, and one reason for that is probably because I seem to have found my inner hippie since moving to the Suffolk coast in my mid-sixties more than 10 years ago. With its gin-clear air and wide horizons, the seaside has definitely brought out the sunny flower child in me.

The fun began almost as soon as I moved here when I started swimming every day in the North Sea, with a group of saltwater junkies. We get high on the tide as we glide through the sunbeam path in the water, at sunrise, and beach talk ranges from haircuts to Homer, cricket to the best curry. As John, one of the swimmers, put it: “It’s a bloody aquatic cocktail party!” It’s also support, companionship, and yes, brings a lot of joy.

I used to do Tai Chi in a health club – now I do it on the beach. I had never been to a music festival in my life but discovered that Latitude is held at the end of our road, and every year, I slip into my cheesecloth dress and hippie hat and spend a lively weekend listening to fabulous music – and I never feel like the oldest hippie in town.

“Turn on, tune in, drop out” was the mantra of my generation that came of age in the Sixties. For those of us who were there, yes, there is the likelihood that we “Turn on, tune in, drop off,” as we slump in front of the TV, and from being a mind-altering drug, LSD now stands for “Let’s Sit Down”, with acid followed by reflux. But while I may be going to San Francisco on a Saga cruise, instead of tripping there on a love bus, with flowers in my hair, in my heart, I’m still experiencing exhilarating moments of joy every day.

So, to get back to where we started… Barbra Streisand emoted in the song “Memories”: “It’s the laughter, we will remember, whenever we remember the way we were.”

It’s a crazy, frightening world at the moment, and we all need to find the good times, the laughter, and yes, fun, wherever we can. Even if it’s in the passenger seat of a pickup truck.

Series five of ‘Conversations from a Long Marriage’ by Jan Etherington, starring Joanna Lumley and Roger Allam, begins on 22 February 2024.; series one to four are available on BBC Sounds

‘Conversations from a Long Marriage’ is published by Profile Books, £9.99