What is the purpose of life, really? The question is not morbid or depressing to me. I find it exciting, even thrilling.

I used to slide back and forth between being certain, on one hand, that life would never end, then, as our culture teaches us, shifting to realize it might be ending for me any day.

I understand now that age does not impede life; life is a magnet pulling me towards a next stop and purpose, but only if I choose to see it that way, and I do.

Feeling old is a choice, not a law or obligation. We are what we have seen and been taught, and in our society, old age means being too old to be valuable,  rich and powerful, or to buy things for decades more.

This is also the way we are taught to be old. Bitch about the cost of medicine and TikTok, but hide your feelings about death. No one is paying attention.

I hope I won’t be afraid to be honest about death, which is dreadful and sometimes freeing. I don’t want to wallow in it, but I won’t hide from it either.

I don’t feel old. And I don’t feel sad about aging. I feel free. I know so many people who grieve about aging almost as much as my friend does about his feelings about his wife’s death.

I grew up in a Jewish culture, where death meant days of mourning, grieving, and covering mirrors with black cloth.

I walked into a nearby Quaker meeting one day and was transfixed by their ritual in death, not to weep, but to gather in gratitude and give thanks for the life of someone they loved. I felt like I was taught all of my life that dying was a horror, something to dread and mourn deeply.

I became a Quaker that morning. My father’s death was still in mourning.

No one I knew ever suggested that everyone one I loved would die. Wasn’t it part of being a human being, something to expect, not just a shocking horror?

Life at any age is a gift, and no matter how much we might, every human being on the earth, from me to a billionaire, is going to end up at the same place.

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It’s appropriate and healthy to grieve, but I always wonder why people are so stunned when their dogs and loved ones die.

Why is death – and age right behind it – such an awful surprise? Death is the same if you’re red or blue; it’s perhaps the only thing in the world that we all share. I embraced the Quaker idea. When a dog or human I loved died, I gave thanks for having them in my life and thought about what I loved about them.

Yet we see aging and death as the enemy, the end. That’s a lie. Few of us elderly know it or are prepared for it, because in our media and culture, death is taboo until someone is being murdered or a house is on fire.

When young people die, it is an awful and painful thing. But when I die – I’m 78 – must it be such a mournful and dreadful shock? What else can we expect? Why can’t we accept it and work on dying well, rather than dreading it and losing sleep over the thought of it?

Won’t Maria find some relief in not having to care for me? I hope so. A good friend told me he felt guilty about feeling relieved over his wife’s death; she was seriously ill for years. He felt bad for being relieved, he said.

I looked up the stats on the longevity of American men. It is between 75.6 and 76.5. I’ve already lived longer than most men do. I’m kind of proud of that, not terrified. Perhaps I’ve done something right, or been blessed by someone or something powerful.

It isn’t something to brag about, but it isn’t something to only weep about either.

My notion is to do some good before I go. That’s easier than most things. That’s enough.

In our culture, death is closely connected to age; one is confused with the other. Since our popular culture won’t ever talk much about either, it’s no surprise that “older people” start counting their fingers to the end the second they are eligible for Social Security and fail to consider what’s left of their lives with imagination or interest.

Each stage of life has its good and bad elements; no one in this world is promised a perfect life or has one, no matter what their publicists say, what their yachts cost, or how big their house is.

My idea is that the purpose of life, now that I am in my late 70s, has been coming into focus lately, not that I am truly old. I think you have to live it to understand it, and then live it some more.

What I found was that the most important dimension of aging well comes from an awareness – it comes later, young people do not need to do it – that there can be a purpose or two to getting old.

There is a reason for old age, like there is a reason for being you. There is a reason to live at any age.

Old age both frees and enlightens. I swear, I am a better person than I was 20 years ago, to my amazement. Everyone I know can see it and feel it. I am more open, more curious, more able to listen, forgive, accept, and accomplish. The rumor is true. Some of the bad genes do die.

I’m slowing down for sure, and need that nap after lunch. Things hurt that didn’t hurt before. My mind is sharp, but I can’t remember names. And there are lots of pills in the bathroom that are new.

We have a choice: find our calling, our purpose, our meaning, or not.

It’s a personal choice; hardly anyone will speak of it or encourage it. It’s really true: they don’t care about us, but we are freeer than ever to think about ourselves and figure out what we want to be up to the end.

I’m looking forward to it. For me, life is not an obstacle but an open gate.

Nothing can stop me now.

Just nature and me.