Mortality
My 30th birthday is coming up (way, way too quickly for my taste to be honest) and that terrifies me a little.. Thirty years is a really long time to be alive. I easily recall when 20 seemed like old age and these days I can remember what happened that many years ago! That's right, I'm afraid of growing old.. I use anti-wrinkle cream and won't leave the house without sunscreen -- erm, that's right, I don't want skin cancer.
I'm not the only one afraid of my own mortality, it seems our society as a whole has grown to hate aging. Magazines, movies, music videos -- youth sells and aging actors are only useful for viagra commercials.. "look at those poor suckers" -- and that's okay. I don't exactly look up to mass media for inspiration or life lessons so it doesn't bother me all that much.. There is something that bothers me a lot more about our society and that is the staggering amount of "retirement communities" popping up everywhere.. It's not just 'retirement homes' it's retirement communities with barber shops, hair salons, restaurants, bars, bingo centers, catholic services and anything else a person may need right on the spot. It seems we are very enamored with the idea of locking our older generation away in an enclosed community and forgetting they exist.. That saddens and frightens me..
I don't want to be old and forgotten and I'm pretty sure my mom does not either.. I refuse to allow that to happen.. Fine, my later years may not be as much fun if I have to drive my aging mother to the hair salon -- but heck at least I'll be with her while she's around. Even if it does mean listening to that story about me being on a diet at the age of 3 for the thousandth time..
Comments
Czesc - Witam !
Diet at age 3? Atkins? or the Ice-Cream Diet?
as someone who has passed the 30 mark seven times now - I can speak from experience - forget about age, it doesnt really mean anything, have fund, do what you love - live life to its fullest - and NEVER have any regrets.....
I am looking forward to taking the next gamble in life, as that is all it is, all a gamble, and some you lose and some you win (depending on HIS mood) but you tried at least, which is more than some around us :)
Happy 30th !
I spent my 30th jumping out of plane at 13,500 feet - do something wild and crazy...then forget the "age thing"
pa
jim
Posted by: jim mcmurry | May 27, 2003 10:35 PM
Happy 30th Birthday Kasia!
That's almost double my age...8-O
No wonder you feel old...;-)
Who knows what this year will have in store for you. You may finally find Mr. Right this year.
On a side note, I always thought anti-wrinkle cream was some kind of capitalist scam to get people's money...
Posted by: Techie2000 | May 27, 2003 10:39 PM
Thanks :) But my birthday isn't until August, I just felt reflective tonight after hearing another radio commercial for a retirement community..
The anti-wrinkle cream must work.. I get carded every time I buy alcohol :)
Posted by: kasia | May 27, 2003 10:41 PM
Only 30? Bah, humbug, that's young (OK, so I'm not THAT much older). Age is relative and unimportant, anyway: hell, most days I feel younger than the 25-year-olds I work with! Death comes when it will and cannot be avoided, so why bother worrying about it? My gran lived to be 102 and never went to live in a retirement home of any sort: I have some wonderful stories written down that she told me in our daily coffee-time. She was a wonderful lady. :)
Posted by: Spike | May 28, 2003 05:20 AM
i think you have the right attitude kasia. my grandmother died a few weeks back and i was very torn up by it...but i see my whole family trying to spend more time together. it will probably scale back a bit eventually, but you shouldn't forget those people who are important to you...no matter what age you are...
Posted by: brandt | May 28, 2003 11:46 AM
Turning 30 was a bit enh, but being 30 rocked. 30 was probably one of the best years of my life (and I've found a lot of friends who say this too). I think it's just the act of turning 30 that's stressful :).
Posted by: gregory | May 28, 2003 11:49 AM
I may be old but I'm immature.
Posted by: dave | May 28, 2003 01:42 PM
Aging may be a bit unsettling, but it's a heck of a lot better than the alternative.
(Hint: use hex. I'll turn 0x33 this year. With a little luck.)
Posted by: Doug L. | May 28, 2003 02:51 PM
I'll be turning 30 this coming November. The thing that amazes me the most is how fast my twenties have gone by. How can 10 years go by so quickly :-)
Posted by: kev | May 28, 2003 03:07 PM
Oh well. Then I guess I can wait until Augest to wish you a 30th birthday. Plus that means you still have a few more months to have fun while your still 29. Then you can have even more fun when you're 30...
Posted by: Techie2000 | May 28, 2003 03:55 PM
I think you have the true nature of the retirement communities back to front. The gates and walls are not to keep the elderly shut away from the younger world, it's for the elderly to keep the rest of the world out. After all, when you're 130, do you *really* want some smart-alec kid who calls herself a l33t hax0r d00d just because she has RedHat 23.7 installed behind her left ear telling you how to setup a firewall?
Posted by: Robert | May 28, 2003 10:04 PM
It could just be my age. I'm middle-aged, a time for consolidation, deepening what you know, ignoring distractions. Time tells me to stop chasing after the latest new everything. Biological life does not want to keep speeding up like a chip design, cycling ever faster year by year.
And maybe there is something unseemly in an old programmer. Maybe the isolated compulsion of coding, its bottomless details, its narrow-well horizon—the sheer electric nervousness required for a relationship with the machine—is simply unnatural for someone over thirty-eight. Maybe an old programmer is like an old Mick Jagger. Past a certain age, it just won't do to keep sticking out your tongue and singing "Satisfaction".
—from Close to the Machine, by Ellen Ullman
Posted by: dave | May 29, 2003 06:22 PM