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Senior living residents act like kids for a day on fun indoor tube ride

Story point senior living tube day
Posted at 2:02 PM, Jan 28, 2022
and last updated 2022-01-28 14:22:12-05

Don't take life too seriously, they say. Well, residents at a Michigan senior living community are taking that advice.

The Story Point Senior Living community in Saline, Michigan, made the best of a winter day indoors and went tubing!

Having fun is important for people of all ages, but science also shows it's a key to longevity for our older friends and relatives too.

In 2018, a Duke-NUS Medical School study in Science Daily showed that even a small increase in happiness contributes significantly to longevity.

"The consistency of the inverse association of happiness with mortality across age groups and gender is insightful -- men and women, the young-old and the old-old, all are likely to benefit from an increase in happiness," said June May-Ling Le, a co-author on the study.

In a video posted to Facebook and TikTok, staff and residents are seen smiling, laughing, and rolling around on the inflated tubes sitting atop a platform with wheels.

Staff tied a rope to the tube to pull residents around on fun rides, sure to knock off any potential cabin fever sluggishness from that time spent indoors on a winter day.

A hashtag on the post to Facebook reads, #ShineEveryday.

Story Point says, "40 years, we've had the best job in the world - loving and caring for seniors."

The video went pretty wild on social media, garnering nearly 8,000 comments and around 70,000 shares.

The video was so popular for the staff and residents at the community that they did a second video asking residents what they think it means to "go viral."

One resident had a bit of trouble defining the new term, while others seemed to have heard about the phenomenon saying that it is when someone starts "sending something to the internet and tons of people look at it."

Then in another clip, a group shouts, "We're famous!!!"