Too Old to Die Young

In the process of scheduling a colonoscopy, a rite of passage for sexagenarians (which I will soon be,) I realized that I am now officially too old to die young. I was never an “I’m here for a good time, not a long time” type of gal. Having always been a cautious person and a productive member of society, my life has nonetheless been punctuated by some uncharacteristically risky activities.

As an unsupervised teenager, I once drove down to Ensenada, Mexico with friends and went skinny-dipping on the beach at midnight. At seventeen, I went skydiving without parental consent. College was four years chock-full of questionable activities.

As a young professional, I lived and worked in developing countries. When I was sent to Haiti, I woke up in my Port au Prince hotel with eighteen spider bites on my face. While traveling in Egypt, I drank the unbottled karkade hibiscus drink that was offered to me at the iftar so as not to offend my hosts breaking their Ramadan fast. As a result, I spent the next few days in extreme gastrointestinal distress, or as I like to lovingly call it, “toilet and bucket.” Even though my dad died in a scuba diving accident, I earned my PADI scuba certification in my twenties. Under a glorious night sky blanketed by stars in Roatán, Honduras, I saw the magical sea creatures that glow in the dark, despite my pounding heart and the expectation that, at any moment, I would be devoured whole by sharks I couldn’t see coming in the dark ocean.

I could go on, but I think I have painted a picture, or at the least the outlines of one.

In my thirties and forties, I settled into the hum of domesticity and productivity. Once I became a mother, in reaction to the parental neglect of my own childhood and the first-hand knowledge of what mischief kids can get up to, I vowed to do better. I knew my children’s whereabouts and companions most of the time. I forced them to wear sunscreen at beaches and pools and to bring jackets when they went out because “it’s better to have one and not need it than to need it and not have it.” And so, whether because of my parenting or despite it, they all made it to adulthood.

My current adventures are tamer. Being old-fart adjacent, I don’t want to get sick or hurt myself since recovery takes much longer, if it even fully happens at all. Long ago, I transitioned from backpacks and youth hostels to nice hotels with comfortable mattresses, and my need for creature comforts has grown exponentially over the years. In other words, I have mellowed with age; some might even say “grown soft.”

Despite my adult responsibilities of work and family, which have clipped my wings to some extent (but which I wouldn’t trade for anything), I am still as mindful as I was in my teens that life is short and precious. I’m no longer jumping out of planes, but I do try to “live my best life” pursuing more mature interests such as traveling and learning new languages. The older I get, the more I cherish time spent with friends and family.

At my last physical, my doctor offered me a test to screen for hundreds of conditions, including Alzheimer’s. However, I declined as I would rather not suffer the mental anguish of knowing what I might get in the future when there are currently no effective treatments or preventions beyond what I am already doing, i.e., eating healthy and exercising.

My dad’s untimely death when I was twelve taught me to appreciate the gift that is life. But that doesn’t mean my primary focus is on longevity. Rather, I would prefer to live as long as my quality of life is good; that the positive still outweighs the negative. And in any case, I console myself with the thought that, at the brink of sixty, I’m playing with house money since I’m already too old to die young.