Tuesday 17 November 2009

Doing a ton

I shall be 45 in December. This has prompted me to make some macabre calculations.

Assuming that I live three score years and ten plus five for advances in modern medicine I will be 75 in 2039. Should I live to the current average of my grandparents' ages, about 87, I will die around the year 2051. If I make it to 100 (my maternal grandmother is nearing this milestone but I haven't had her advantage of a calorie restricted diet in youth) I might see in 2065!

Doing these sums helps me to to think about who will be on the throne when I am old (assuming my campaign for a republic is unsuccessful), who will send me my telegram!

I can calculate roughly how meagre my state pension will be; just how crowded Colindale will be by then; and even begin to imagine, based on how much culture/technology, etc, have changed in the time I have already lived, what sort of music people will be listening to, how few clothes the singers will be wearing, what vehicles we might be travelling around in, and what fuel they will run on... that's assuming we are all still here.

I find thinking about these things oddly comforting - or it could just be the Seasonal Affective Disorder kicking in. Anyway, it makes a welcome distraction from my other labours.

2 comments:

Duncan Macdonald said...

I'll be 45 next July. What I want to know is how did I get to be this old this fast?

Citizen Barnet said...

Thou hast nor youth, nor age, But as it were an after-dinner's sleep dreaming on both.
-Shakespeare, Measure for Measure

Well, that's how I feel, anyway.