Strike one!

It has taken me two thirds of a century to realize that people think they are older than they are. It makes sense. Our present age is the oldest we have ever been. We can only imagine what it will be like to be older and in a youth oriented society older is generally not better.

After twenty one, or perhaps twenty five when auto insurance becomes more affordable, we think of age as diminishing. Diminished beauty. Diminished opportunities. Diminished possibilities of every sort. There were several reasons for this, some still valid, others not so.

In the not so distant past people aged faster due to a lack of proper nutrition and health care and they had fewer expectations for quality of life after a certain age. Today this is often not the case. We can eat as healthy as we choose and even if we lack access to great health care, the access others have eliminates many communicable diseases. Most people born in 1900 expected to die around fifty, that is no longer true.

I see people who consider themselves old because they believe they have reached a certain age. That is often only in their head. I believe it is really important to look at ourselves from the future! When I am ninety, sixty six will seem very young. I do not want to start giving myself false limitations!

I drive just as well, maybe better due to experience, as I ever did -- day or night. I think just as clearly too, although I have a much larger amount of things to remember. I get around really good when my left foot is happy with its orthotic (But that was true when I was thirty two! I am better informed and more confident than I was at forty and I am relatively happy with myself.

Old age will eventually strike, but I expect it somewhere around ninety five.