Aging: NEVER TOO OLD

Instructor George Breathitt asked an audience of 300 computer enthusiasts in Louisville, Kentucky, how many seniors in the group would like to teach other seniors about computers. A younger member of the audience quipped disdainfully, ``Wouldn't that be the blind leading the blind?'' He was promptly booed: almost half the audience was over 50. In fact, Breathitt, 61, has attracted so many seniors willing to teach -- and learn -- about computers that he founded a successful firm to employ them. So far, his Silver Fox Computer Club has taught about 7,500 students and expanded into four states.

So who says computers are only for youngsters? The American Association of Retired Persons, the nation's largest organization of senior citizens, counts 2 million computer users among its 33 million members. And with more leisure time and discretionary income than many youths, thousands of seniors -- including many who have never before used a computer -- are entering the cyberculture, burying the hoary old-dog-new-tricks axiom. ``Once they get used to handling the mouse,'' says Breathitt, ``they learn faster than teenagers.''

Seniors are using their new computing power to do everything from monitoring investments to tracking genealogy to producing their memoirs. Some have started postretirement businesses making greeting cards or performing legal research on the Internet. But the majority say they were drawn to computers because, like Jack Fowler, 75, of Sun City West, Arizona, they simply didn't want to be left behind by progress. ``I couldn't keep up with my four-year- old grandson,'' says the retired pharmacist.

Ilene Weinberg, 68, a former social worker from Newton, Massachusetts, didn't want to get a computer; her typewriter worked just fine. But two years ago, her son gave her one anyway, hoping it might help make up for the debilitating effects of her Parkinson's disease. Now she spends so much time online that she has installed another phone line. ``I feel like I'm with it,'' says Weinberg. ``I'm connecting with the present and the future.''