some well-made points - for me, experienced is something to be respected, rather than being thrown out with the trash.
However, not one person here has mentioned the reason most airlines are delighted to offload pilots at a certain age. It's about wage discrimination, rather than age discrimation - and, possibly, attitude discrimination. Look at it from a bean-counters view; you cost a fortune after working your way through the ranks and seniority and pay levels over the years. You also come from an era where pilots were respected and given in to on many factors which also cost money, and your younger brethren are more, eh - flexible in their attitudes (I do realise that's a generalisation!). You could safely say that the reason airlines like BA will keep pilots over the old 55 limit is because they have to given circumstances, because the costs would be savage. Any culling of flight staff you see in an airline will always begin with the oldest pilots - if they can get away with it, it's the law of the jungle.
I know many older pilots who do ferry work or work independently as TREs or SFIs and make a decent living, including having free time rather than working round the clock. But, how realistic is it to expect that an airline will continue to pay their higher earners if they can replace them with cheaper and more flexible people who do the same job at the end of the day?