Stress and Ageing

This is the second post associated with non-linear and linear thinking. As I have stated previously, I am 73 years old, and I can consider myself as aged. That scares the bejesus out of me. Or at least it should. But looking at this problem from a non-linear perspective, I think it is something I can attack…, but not necessarily win. This brings me to the subject of today’s pondering. What is so negative, from my perspective, about ageing? It is that I am becoming increasingly limited, which is absolutely not OK with me. Sally has stated many, many times that her husband (that is me, BTW) will not grow old gracefully.

Yup. I will not.

I have no fear of dying but being mentally decrepit is a fate that I am not looking forward to. I know that, just like Ronald Reagan, this decrepitude is possibly in my not too distant future. It is a natural fact. I will either just drop dead or decompose while technically remaining alive. I will discuss my thoughts on dying someday but not today. Today, I am going to offer my thoughts on how I am going to postpone the “decompose while remaining technically alive” part until “I just drop dead”.

This is my embrace of stress. By stress I mean being in a situation where I could in all probability lose it all. This “All” is my comfortable little retired old man life. And, I mean Everything. Everything means all of my First World creature comforts including financial. And it is up to me to come up with a plan when I just don’t know for sure what to do and how to do it.

This stressful life is exhilarating. And this keeps me constantly striving to stay ahead of the pack. I don’t know if I am going fail or not. I am attempting the modern American equivalent of my Neanderthal man attacking his lunch without becoming his lunch’s lunch.

This stressful life is how you defeat the decrepitude that so many elderly fall into when life is just too easy.

Dealing with a stressful life is in our genes. In my opinion, Stress is preferable to Ageing.