The Aging Process

The current Time Magazine has devoted about 40 pages to the aging process - including how to pay for it.

As you know, I am extremely interested in this process.  Especially since I'm in the middle of it.  It's not depressing to me.  It's exciting.  I read someplace a while back that....dying is currently a speciality niche - it used to be that everybody did it.  

Well, of course, everybody still does it.  Only now, as in never before in the course of human history, we can have some input into how and when.  But still - no guarantees.

Here are a few quotes from Time:

...the majority of Americans (say) they would like to live 100 years if they could do so in good health... but most of them (say) they want to retire at 65, and most of them (say) they eat too much and tend not to exercise.

So we can clearly see the problem.

Imagine you just got some very, very bad news.  You don't have much longer to live, maybe only a couple of years, and there's nothing anyone...can do about it.   Welcome to every day in the life of a very old person. 

The article says that, contrary to what we'd think, the older we get, the less afraid we are to die.  I think that, in addition, the more we talk about it and plan for it, the more comfortable we get to be with the concept.  For me, it also enriches my time.  Why would I want to be mad or sad or worried all the time - when time's running short?  Time Magazine goes on to say, "The certainty of a journey's end might make better travelers of us all."

The news about Alzheimer's is still bad.  Currently there is no real treatment.  And 50% of us will have some kind of dementia by the time we're 85.  But help seems to be on the horizon.  For example, we have cured Alzheimer's in mice.

Lake Eola

The article focuses on healthful living, financial security and social engagement.  The first two are no surprise but most of us don't realize how important social relationships are.  We're wired for relationships,  As for the healthy living and financial part, we know we need to exercise, eat well and save our money - but we don't.

Except Dave and I do.  We're those boring people who have exercised and tried to eat well and saved our money and scarified some fun to pay off our mortgages.  We also have projects and people we invested in so that we'll have these investments live on long after we're gone.  All of this has gone a long way to make us happy in our old age.

But today we're going downtown to take our two mile walk around beautiful Lake Eola.  Then have a yummy but not expensive and not fat laden lunch outdoors.


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