They say we can expect to live about 70-80 years. Perhaps our generation can expect to hit 100 years.

You spend your younger ages just learning. Exploring the world. Finding yourself in this vast universe.

Sometime during this time you recognize the importance of death, but so what? It’s far away. You have at least many more years to go. No need to think about it.

You’re 20 now. Ready to make your way into the world. You realize you want to leave your mark on it, but you don’t…really know how. You don’t know who you are yet. Or you do and you’re unhappy with who you are. You want to change yourself. You want to be the person you dreamt would have been your guiding figure when you were younger. That’s fine. You have 80 years to go.

30 now. Woah, time flies. Didn’t you just graduate college yesterday? You graduated, they taught you… something. Was it important? You suppose it was. Probably it was. You’re still learning though. Live and learn, right? There’s 70 years to figure out how you’re going to mark your passing.

The famous singer of your childhood just died. Holy smokes. He died at the age of 85. You see this as you read the news, and the nostalgia hits you. You’re 40. You feel…like it just happened. You never saw it coming, even though you knew it was happening all along.

The rain refuses to fall as you stand in the circle around your mother’s grave. Your heart is full of all the grateful thoughts you regret not saying to her. But she left her mark. On you. On her family. But you realize, as you leave the cemetery, that that was all there was to it. She was part of your world, and maybe a few others. A large landmark, for sure. But just that. What have you achieved in your 50 years of living? The same? Slightly more? Not even? What was the point of your life?

You don’t even keep track of your age much anymore. Oh wait you do. Five more years before you can collect your social security. Ah, the government recently changed it to 85, not 65. Things have changed since your father’s generation. The world has changed. That place you wanted to save up for retirement – well, it doesn’t exist any more. Someone or someones have made their mark on THAT place…a fine disappearing act.

What a time to be alive. They just got rid of your recent brain tumor, something that wouldn’t have been possible when you were young. You can still expect to live until the ripe old age of…whenever, really. You think the government recently stated that the life expectancy was 120. Jeebus. Half a century more to figure how you’re going to make your death meaningful. That’s a long time, even for you.

You’ve been collecting your social security for five years now. They celebrated your birthday yesterday. You can’t remember who came to help you cut your cake but you think they may have been part of your family. Maybe. You vaguely remember your son telling you your grandsons couldn’t come because of the ongoing world war. You also have a feeling of some…nagging urgency. Something important. It was coming, slowly and steadily. You know it, but you can’t really name it. It was…is important. You think so. Or you thought so. Was it still?

You feel so tired. So tired. People you knew no longer exist and people who know you seem nonexistent. Your family appears once a year to help you cut your cake and remind you of whatever age you are now, but you don’t really care. It’s no longer important. You spend your days staring out of the window, trying to remember what you once knew. It was something you wanted to matter because you thought it was important. You had time for it. You could have made it work. What was it? What happened to it? It…