When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in slippers in the rain
And pick flowers in other people's garden
And learn to spit.
So begins the poem of Jenny Joseph, one of the inspirations for the Red Hat Society an organisation whose membership criteria is to be a woman of a certain age who wants to have fun, freedom, friendship, fulfilment and fitness.
