Another once-upon-a-lifetime high school friend turned 70 Tuesday. As Paul Simon wrote back in his twenties, “How terribly strange to be 70.”
I should have some wisdom to share, I should run up a flag of understanding to signal those who have yet to journey this far: Watch out for this! Try not to do that! I wish I had realized thus and so!
Any such statements that come to mind are things I had to discover for myself anyway — I would have thought, “That won’t be MY experience” — and so my sage advice for people heading this way (and we are all heading this way) is to live your life as fully as you can, which is what you will do anyway.
What has worked best for me are the Zero Aggression Principle — I respect your right to live your life and refuse to initiate force except in self-defense — and the Two Great Commandments — Love God and love my neighbor (and P.S. everyone is a neighbor).
I share a lot of time with a newly minted octogenarian who likes to remind me that there’s a lot of difference between 70 and 80. My surprising decline from 68 to 70 is still fresh in my mind, and so I can imagine what the next eight years will bring.
We live a fragile existence in a fragile world, and it behooves us to handle ourselves, our family and friends and neighbors, and our world, with care — and by care I also mean love.
