On Old Age
I&#x27;m 50 now, and this is going to be hard for me because I&#x27;ve got little practice in dealing with disability. Even now, I&#x27;m about to run a celebratory 50k rather than my usual yearly 42k marathon. I will never again break my best time, but it&#x27;s my annual proof that I can still do this thing.<p>And yet it&#x27;s coming. Bifocals are in my near future. I have very preliminary symptoms of prostate trouble. I&#x27;m not used to needing any kind of help for anything or having to take a pill every single day, but I need to get ready for that, because it&#x27;s going to happen. Not today, not tomorrow, but soon, and for the rest of my life.<p>It could have happened at any point. I&#x27;m incredibly fortunate to be so healthy. I ate well-ish and exercised, but lots of people do more and become disabled through accident or less fortunate genetics. I think Cicero would agree that I&#x27;ve lived more or less nobly; I&#x27;ve done my best, or at least my pretty-good.<p>I&#x27;m not afraid of it being over, but I&#x27;m trying to figure out how to deal with &quot;the same ills would befall him and all other old men&quot;. I don&#x27;t expect acquired wisdom to suffice: I honestly don&#x27;t think I&#x27;ve gotten any spectacular insights &quot;reason and good judgement&quot;. As for the &quot;old men [without whom] no state would have existed at all&quot;, I really don&#x27;t think posterity is going to look kindly on us.<p>Posterity isn&#x27;t really what I&#x27;m worried about. I just want to live a decent life, where &quot;decent&quot; has always been defined as being able to continue to do what I&#x27;ve always done. Doors will gradually close. There&#x27;s a tee-shirt that they sell at marathons to the tune of &quot;Some day I will not be able to do this. Today is not that day.&quot; At 50 I&#x27;m able to see the point at which today is that day. I&#x27;ve got a while to adjust to it, but the adjustment itself is uncomfortable, and Cicero&#x27;s not really making me feel better.