FUN LONG AFTER 60

STORY: Michael Jacobs

SPORT: BALLROOM DANCING

So many seniors take dance at Academy Ballroom Atlanta in Buckhead that studio owner Eddie Ares views them as two age groups: those up to 80 and those beyond. For some, ballroom is a step back toward the ballet of their youth. Others have no history on the dance floor. But alone, as a couple or with friends, it’s never too late to start, Ares says.

Some seniors stay at Academy for a decade or more as they spin and dip into competitions held monthly in age groups that stretch into the 90s.

Two dances aren’t a good fit for seniors past 75 because of the exertion, Ares says: the quick step and the paso doble. Everything else is in play. Introductory packag- es of five lessons start at $65.

In addition to the physical benefits of dancing as exercise, ballroom enhances mental sharpness from learning and repeating the movements, which Ares says is why some early-stage dementia patients take classes. Ballroom also is a great social activity, he says. Newcomers fit in easily because they have an area of shared interest: dance. And because students of all ages are in the studio, they make friendships across generations.

“It becomes almost like a family,” Ares says.

SOCIAL: MAH-JONGG

Mah-jongg continues to draw players 60 and older as it spreads beyond its founding Asian culture.

“The pace of the game is nice,” says Shawn Martin, a Brookhaven resident who has turned her mah- jongg hobby into a business teaching the game around the Buckhead area with her daughter and runs the Facebook group Rocket Mah Jongg. Each round, in which four players take turns drawing and discarding tiles until one completes a 14-tile hand, lasts about 25 minutes, and sessions typically last two hours but can stretch to four, she says.

Diana Mir, an Atlanta resident who took up mah-jongg in retirement after a back injury forced her to drop golf, advises finding a teacher to start because the game is complicated and isn’t fun with people of different experience levels.

Some senior centers and libraries offer lessons. The Marcus Jewish Community Center in Dunwoody is starting beginner and advanced classes and provides space for free open play for members and nonmembers ages 60 and up Mondays and Wednesdays from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.

The American version of the game requires a new card detailing valid hands each year from the National Mah Jongg League. Standard print costs $14; large print is $15. A set of tiles can range from $100 to $400.

“Studies show that it’s good for your brain,” Martin says. “It’s a good social activity. I see strangers build lifelong friendships.”

OUTDOOR: GOLF

Claude Rhen was an occasional weekend hacker who used to play tennis when he joined the Senior Golfers

Association of Atlanta in retirement in 2003. The Dunwoody resident, 84, still plays once or twice a week.

“It’s the camaraderie,” he says. “You meet some great people.”

The group plays Monday to Thursday mornings, moving among 20 courses in the greater Atlanta area. The annual membership fee is $25. “You can’t join a club for that,” Rhen says.

Members must be at least 55 and pay an initiation fee of $25 in addition to the dues. Every outing is a tournament split into flights based on handicaps. Greens fees are $25 to $40, and each player contributes $5 to a prize pool.

The group takes four out-of-town trips each year, the biggest of which is the member-guest three-day trip.

Association banquets in February and November mark the start and end of the season.

Rhen says membership has declined in recent years, so the association lets golfers join any time of year.

Golfers can send a membership request through the website, he says. “We invite them out initially with one of our members to play a round with us so they get an idea what goes on.” n

ACADEMY BALLROOM ATLANTA

404.846.3201 • academyballroomatl.com @academyballroomatlanta

MAH-JONGG atlantajcc.org/openplay nationalmahjonggleague.org facebook.com/rocketmahjongg

SENIOR GOLFERS ASSOCIATION OF ATLANTA sgaofatlanta.org

Taking up comedy in your 60s, says Kurt Blumthal, 61, means that after you put in a decade honing your style, writing and handling of hecklers, your audience is likely to be in a memory care facility in Florida. So you’ll need only one joke.

Blumthal, a senior mortgage banker for Ameris Bank who lives in Brookhaven, is a lifelong class clown who saw the likes of Rodney Dangerfield, Richard Pryor and Robin Williams at a theater where he worked in his native Fort Lauderdale.

Years of talk about comedy classes led him in 2022 to a six-week, $599 course at Jeff Justice’s Comedy Workshoppe in Buckhead. He then took a second course from Justice and improv classes at Whole World Improv Theatre.

“Now there’s a whole subculture of friends that I have,” Blumthal says. “We go to the Landmark Diner once a month, and we sit down at our corner table, and we write and laugh.”

The initial class was the gift of Carol Stewart, with whom Blumthal has lived for five years. They aren’t married, fueling one routine in his observational comedy.

“What the hell do you call each other when you’re our age?” Blumthal says.

“Spouse” or “wife” is untrue. “Partner” has same-sex connotations. “Girlfriend,” he says, “makes me sound like a 12-year-old.”

“Lady friend” sounds like a hooker. “If I say ‘lover,’ I sound like a jerk.”

The punchline: “I introduce her as Carol, and she just introduces me as asshole.”

Blumthal keeps the jokes PG13, following mentor Justice’s advice for wide appeal. He appears at open-mic nights a few times a month. The Punchline and Laughing Skull Lounge are his favorites for performing or watching.

Blumthal won an open-mic contest at the Decatur Arts Festival last May, earning $50 and a chance to headline this year.

He isn’t changing careers, though he hopes to land enough corporate gigs to make comedy a paying hobby.

Besides, he has a bum shoulder, so golf is out. n