Only Connect (2 Letters) - NYTimes.com Re "Forging Social Connections for Longer Life" (Personal Health, March 27): Jane E. Brody's struggle with loneliness after her husband's death shows us how important social connections are for healthy aging. She mentions that family, friends, church and volunteer groups all provide health-promoting social connections. One important outlet she does not mention is paid work. In this economy, as many older Americans struggle to reconcile their need to work, even part time, with their long-held dreams of retirement, it is important to realize that work provides much more than just a paycheck. Work provides many social contacts and enables a sense ofcontribution, and belonging, to society. And workplaces provide rich andauthentic intergenerational connections that are rare in other settings. Caitrin Lynch Needham, Mass. The writer is the author of "Retirement on the Line." The rugged individualism that remains in the American DNA drives the social isolation that is so often lethal to the middle-aged and elderly, thanks to the autonomy we take such pride in earlier in life. Unlike most social species, whose needs are met with the help of the group, we transfer our dependence to automobiles, the news media, medical care and processed food, thus camouflaging our needs with the fig leaf of phony self-reliance. We should take our cue from the writings of Hillary Clinton. Whether raising a child or sustaining an adult, it does indeed take a village. Christopher Bailey, M.D. Seattle