The Windsor Star from Windsor, Ontario, Canada • 37

The indsor SUr wimta Nstar.com Saturday, March 14, 2015 D3 Breaking down 'digital divide' LIFE Internet helps seniors cope better: Research (7- fpV Vancouver Sun Gerontology research says seniors who use the Internet are more educated about their health, less depressed and feel less isolated. that many of these people have health issues or financial constraints that prevent them from logging on. But there's a cultural gap at play here, too: The vast majority of seniors who aren't online think they're either not missing anything, or even if they are that the new technology is just too difficult to learn. That maybe, at a certain age, it's just not worth it. Increasingly of course, gerontology research shows the exact opposite to be true: Seniors are actually more lost without the Internet than with it.

Seniors who log on tend to be far more educated about their health; they're far less isolated and more independent. One study out of the University of Michigan suggested that Internet use could cut depression risk among seniors by more than 30 per cent a huge finding, given the wide-ranging effects that depression and isolation have on senior's health. "These skills and devices enable communication, entertainment, health management, in a demographic where face-to-face social networks are shrinking as friends pass away and children and grandchildren are more geographically diverse," said Kate Mag-samen-Conrad, a professor at Bowling Green State, who runs a computer literacy program for seniors. 50th: Dave and Joanne McMurren were married March 20, 1965, at St. Simon and St.

Jude Church in Belle River. They will celebrate their golden anniversary with family and friends during an open house on Sunday, March 22 from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at St. John's Hall, Woodslee.

Best wishes only. The Star photo policy The Star publishes, at no charge, 50th, 55th, 60th, 65th and 70th wedding anniversaries, and birthdays for those 90,95, 100 and older. These announcements run in the Saturday Star. Current photos should be submitted by email to jrevin windsorstar.com, or regular mail at least one month prior to the event. Photos will only be returned by mail if you provide a self-addressed, stamped envelope.

Otherwise, they may be picked up at the front desk of The Star's downtown office after they appear. For more information, phone 519-255-5546 between 8:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. Monday through Friday i siiyn I wsuf "in 1 JW ph "I 'iPM Hj I'll ll i) rP-i i CAITLIN DEWEY The Washington Post Kerstin Wolgers made it through 82 years on this Earth without ever once checking an email, watching a YouTube clip or sending a tweet. But last week, as part of a crash course that introduced her to the Internet for the first time, the former Swedish actress did all three plus Googled, Instagrammed, Wikipedia-ed, shopped, video-gamed even online-dated, eventually.

"Lots going on here," she says of Tinder. "It's really exciting, if you asked me." Exciting but also confusing, "difficult" and "mad." Over a period of only five days during which she wore a heart monitor to track her anxiety and a camera to beam her adventures online Wolger learned a lifetime's worth of Internet skills, from how to conduct a Google search and pay a bill online to where to watch cat videos and Gangnam Style. At the conclusion of her grand experiment, Wolgers conducted an interview on adults sitting on the floor," Ozeki said in an interview in Portland, where she spent a week as artist-in-rcsidence for Literary Arts, a non-profit that promotes literature and writers. Ozeki's Japanese heritage tugged at her. After graduating from Smith College in 19B0, she received a fellowship to study Japanese literature at Nara Women's University.

While in Japan she also worked as a bar hostess, studied Noh drama, started a language school and taught Engl ish at Kyoto Sangyo Reddit that briefly reached the site's front page. "I actually think that the world is better with access to Internet," she wrote on Reddit, when asked whether she thought the Internet was a bad thing. "It opens up so many possibilities!" And not just to play Battlefield or meet (much younger!) men but to access social services and participate in larger social discussions. Wolgers, as you may have guessed by this point, didn't dive into the Internet for the lolz alone. Her grand experiment was part of a Swedish advocacy campaign, organized by the pub University.

After moving to New York City in 1985, she designed props and sets for low-budget horror movies. In the 1990s she started making her own documentaries, including the award-winning autobiographical film Halving The Bones. Her first two novels were about the cco-dangcrs of American food production: My Year of Meats and All Over Creation, published In 1998 and 2003, respectively Ozeki had long been drawn to meditation, and she became lic relations firm MyNewsDesk, that aimed to draw attention to the "digital divide" the often invisible gulf between people who use the Internet and those who still do not, particularly among seniors. In Sweden, campaigners claim, as many as one in 10 people don't have access to theWeb. That's actually slightly better than the situation in the United States, where 13 per cent of adults say they don't use the Internet.

If you drill it down to just seniors, that number jumps dramatically to 41 per cent, or about 16 million people. Research from Pew suggests more serious about it as her parents aged and died. Her spiritual beliefs helped shape her most recent novel, A Tale For The Time Being, a finalist in 2013 for the prestigious Man Booker Prize. The title borrows from an essay by Dogen on time titled Uji, often translated from the Japanese as The Time-Being. The novel features a Hello Kitty lunch box that washes ashore on an island in British Columbia, a Japanese-American woman named Ruth who finds the lunch box, a teenage girl in Japan who owns the lunch box, and a 104-year-old Zen Buddhist nun at a remote monastery in Japan.

Magic is woven into the bjok. Words vanish, ghosts appear, characters change shape, and time does weird things. These metaphysical elements come right out of the box of Buddhist principles, intended to convey messages that all things are interconnected, nothing is permanent, and there is no abiding self. Ozeki's book is literally an act of Zen. She uses literary techniques that seek to collapse time and space in the readers' imagination.

The effect on readers can be similar to what practitioners of Zen feel as they sit In meditation, In 2010 Ozeki was ordained a Zen Buddhist priest. PHOTOS: LITERARY ARTSThe Associated Press Ruth Ozeki, a novelist and Zen Buddhist priest, conducted master classes in fiction writing and on meditation and creativity and spoke with high school students during her week as author-in-residence with Literary Arts, a non-profit in Portland, Oregon that promotes literature and writers. Ruth Ozekfs spiritual beliefs assume creative form ugUp jiff 153 Zen principles dominate her novel TERRENCE PETTY The Associated Press PORTLAND, ORE. Novelist Ruth Ozeki's spiritual companion is a Zen master named Do-gen. Dead for nearly 800 years, when you listen to Ozeki, you know he's there.

Addressing nearly 2,300 Ozeki fans inside a concert hall here, the critically acclaimed novelist talked about Dogen's perception of time. Each day consists of 6,400,099,980 moments, and in the time it takes to snap your finger, 65 moments have passed, the Japanese Zen master wrote in the 13th century. Of course, this is "rhetorical sleight of hand," Ozeki told the crowd. Counting moments is like trying to grab a fistful of water. But Dogen has a purpose: to get humans to slow down and think about their actions at every moment and not rush through the days.

Be aware. Be alive. "I find his view of time astonishing," Ozeki says of Dogen. "There's always enough time, if you just slowdown." Ozeki's commitment to Zen Buddhism has grown over the "I'm a priest with training wheels," says Ozeki, who continues to go through various stages of Zen training. The novelist and her husband live on an island near British Columbia's rainy Desolation Sound, just like Ruth in A Tale For The Time Being.

Last fall, she had two months of head monk training at the Zen community in Vancouver. She taught classes, gave talks, offered tea, and cleaned the toilets, a chore that helps keep Zen priests from getting lofty ideas about themselves. During her artist-in-resi-dence stay in Portland, Ozeki spoke with high school students and also conducted classes in fiction writing and on meditation and creativity As she wrapped up her visit, Ozeki spoke at Portland's grand Arlcne Schnitzcr Concert Hall. At the close of the evening, Ozeki gave the audience an Introduction to Zen meditation. She asked everyone to put their hands on their laps and sit up straight With Ozeki softly coaching them, nearly 2,300 souls watched their thoughts and their worries pass through their minds, not dwelling on them, quietly letting them go, being mindful of every moment.

Dogen, Ozeki's ancient companion, did not say a word. But ho was surely smiling. Ruth Ozeki, author of A Tale For The Time Being, describes herself as a Zen Buddhist priest 'with training wheels' after her ordination in 2010. past several years. Her spiritual and creative lives are intertwined.

Ozeki was raised in Connecticut by a Japanese mother and an American father. Neither was religious. Her very first memory is of a visit by her grandparents to Connecticut in 1959. The three-year-old girl wont to tell her grandparents that breakfast was ready. When she entered the room they were sitting in Zen meditation.

"They were at eye level with me. I wasn't used to seeing.