So I made it to 2026. I'm 70 now, and my health has begun to decline rather precipitously. After being on extremely expensive blood thinners for about three months to prevent clots, stroke, and heart attack, my body is now, for some reason, making far too many red blood cells. The result is very thick blood. My rising hematocrit numbers are a growing concern.
There are indications that, along with heart and kidney issues, this blood problem may be part of the larger process of decline that eventually comes for all of us.
If it weren’t happening to me, it would actually be a fascinating look at how humans age and slowly break down before the end.
Reaching seventy is a strange milestone. In my head, I’m still twenty-five.
The late George Harrison once said in an interview, “It’s nothing to go from 17 to 57. It just happens so fast.”
For me, the years from 50 to 70 passed in the blink of an eye.
In that short stretch of time, I lost my mother, my brother-in-law, a sister entered memory care, a dear friend next door passed away, and a nephew’s young son died far too early. My ex-wife lost her father and her life changed as well.
Somewhere in the middle of all that, my perception of time — and my own mortality — shifted dramatically.
Intellectually, I’ve always known that all living things eventually die. But watching it happen in real time is something else entirely. It’s a jolt to the consciousness.
At seventy, that jolt hits exponentially harder.
Living alone with almost no human contact forces me to have these conversations entirely inside my own mind. There’s no outside input, only my own worries and concerns echoing around.
It probably isn’t healthy to live so isolated.
But it’s the life I chose many years ago for reasons that seemed solid at the time. Back then, it felt easier.
Looking back, I clearly didn’t think it through.
My mind needs more input now — more living, more nature, more discovery, some kind of passion for something… anything.
Today a neighbor and his wife came over and started vacuuming leaves in my yard with two mowers. It was an oddly uncomfortable experience watching it happen.
Just a few minutes earlier, I had been talking with him about some of my health issues — something I seem unable to avoid when asked how things are going. The next thing I knew, he and his wife were bagging leaves in my yard.
Do they see a frailty in me that I can feel but don’t want to acknowledge?
Are my health problems becoming visible to others?
My mother used to tell me, " Never tell everything to anyone."
I’ve had trouble in the past from forgetting that advice and saying too much before thinking.
People — even well-meaning people — don’t actually want to hear all your problems. They probably have plenty of their own. And once they hear yours, they feel obligated to respond: What can I do to help?
But most of the time I’m not asking for help. I’m simply answering the question.
So perhaps the better response when someone asks how things are going is the one my mother suggested long ago:
“Fine. It’s great to be alive. Thanks for asking. How are you?”
One thing has always been certain:
Nothing is for certain.
If I wake up tomorrow, it’s a good day.
If God’s plan for me doesn’t end today, then I need to have a plan of my own and go get after it.
Worry won’t cure anything. Concern won’t heal the cause of it.
Find something else to think about.
Do something — anything.
Just get up, move, and keep moving forward.
If I make it to 71, it won’t be because I sat around worrying about my health when I could have been living every single moment and absorbing some kind of life — any kind.
The end will come soon enough.
There’s no need to invite it early.
More peace.
More music.
Laugh some.
Worry less.
Live every minute.
Go to the gym.
