Here's an obscure statistic I recently heard. Among elderly women, which ethnicity is likeliest to commit suicide, at least in New York?

Asians!

The reason, according to the Samaritans suicide prevention league, is that they come from a part of the world that respects, even reveres, the elderly. Then they end up here, where being old is a crime.

You can tell it's a crime, because we make the elderly wear prison gray. Look at their aluminum canes: gray. Metal crutches: gray. The preponderance of walkers: gray. Sure, aluminum is lightweight and durable, but must it also be utterly devoid of design and cheer? I see old folks valiantly shuffling down the sidewalk and just don't understand why the whole category of walking aids has yet to be revolutionized like, well, seeing aids. You know — glasses.

A century ago, glasses were pretty straightforward, if not downright dull. Then some genius got the idea of jazzing them up and wa-a-a-y overcharging (how much can a piece of plastic cost?) and now — you're wearing them. You may even be wearing the kind with lenses that pretend not to be bifocals but really are. I am! And for this bit of vanity, you (or your anachronistically generous health plan) are willing to pay through the nose. It's worth it (though perhaps not to your insurance company) because now you look — and feel — younger.

But why have failing eyes gotten the modernized makeover that failing limbs, for the most part, have not? It seems like such a lucrative market. Every single day, another 10,000 baby boomers turn 50, according to the MetLife Mature Market Institute, and already 30 percent say they've survived a major illness. Pretty soon, they all are going to need some help, and Advertising Age says they've got $1 trillion — literally — to spend.

How hard would it be for someone to encrust a walker with jewels? I spoke with futurist business consultant Richard Gottlieb, who envisions a world filled with Harley wheelchairs, Donna Karan walkers — even iPod hearing aids. Why not? They'd look exactly like the earbuds everyone else is wearing and going deaf from (a self-sustaining market!). But at the moment, "no one sees the elderly or infirm as having fashion sense," Gottlieb said. "They write them off as willing to take just about anything."

Isn't it the job of the marketing world to realize when a category has been totally overlooked and start making it cool, branded and pricey (like, say, water)? Not that I want to bankrupt the elderly, but why shouldn't they be exploited by trendsetters like everyone else?

A handful of innovators have thought about this, of course. A company called Rollator is making walkers in attractive metallic colors. I saw a woman using one the other day (now that I'm looking, I've seen three in the past week), so I asked, "Does it cheer people up?"

"It cheers me up," she replied.

Same here! I don't want to look forward to growing gray along with my devices. Think of what Clairol did for hair. It's time to do that for the rest of aging's accessories.

Once we start treating the tools of old age as a valuable market, maybe we'll start treating old people as valuable, too. Imagine that.

Lenore Skenazy is the author of "Free-Range Kids: How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children (Without Going Nuts with Worry)" and "Who's the Blonde That Married What's-His-Name? The Ultimate Tip-of-the-Tongue Test of Everything You Know You Know — But Can't Remember Right Now." To find out more about Lenore Skenazy ([email protected]) and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.