On Being Ninety

If you’ve had enough luck so far, since with a little more of it you’ll reach ninety in good health, you’ll be glad to know that, despite attenuated life expectancy and diminished mobility, this can be a much better situation than I imagined when I was young. By this age, little is expected of you, and only a smattering of your relatives and friends your age are still around and none from older generations. You may feel, as I do, as if you died some time ago but were able to return with barely a care for yourself in the world and check out the scene, become aware of some important things that hadn’t previously entered your consciousness, and try to accomplish something significant you had thought about but neglected to attend to when you were alive earlier.