Now That I Am 80 Maybe It's Time To Expand My Horizons.

There is more past to look back on than there is future to anticipate!

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I realized not too long ago that I have more past to reflect on than I do future to anticipate. I have more travel adventures to remember than I do travel adventures to plan. I have more milestones and millstones to process than I do to celebrate or about which to worry.

When I was younger, say in my thirties, I didn’t think much about my future. I didn’t have any life insurance until I began teaching and that fortunately came with the job.

I didn’t think much about death and up to that time only had experienced the death of grandparents, which one might say is expected. I did not have any pets as a young adult so no death experience there.

Luckily my immediate family and I had excellent health so no emergency room visits, no catastrophic illnesses (until later), no disabilities or health-related issues that can complicate life and point towards death.

As a writer, I wrote about “life messages” on the tens as part of processing my getting older. At a certain point, I began to look at five-year increments. I think this was because I realized that for sure I was getting older and was able to face the fact that I was closer to dying than I was from being born.