I have to admit that I have always held few romantic feelings about old age. I’ve shared our culture’s prejudice about older people being loving, sexy, or having sex – an idea that made me twitch when I was younger, and one that is rarely mentioned in our modern, youth-obsessed Pilgrim culture.

To think of it, I never thought of my parents or older people having sex, although they did have three children, and I’ve seen them fall in love.

I ran a men’s group while volunteering at the town’s Medicaid facility for older adults. Although none of the men spoke openly in the meeting about sex, almost every one arranged to speak with me privately about their wish and need for sex. They hadn’t quit on it. I didn’t raise it with my mostly female meditation group.

The men’s group didn’t last long. Sex is an important part of life. I will concede wanting and needing sex myself, even at the age of 79.

I won’t say any more about it; I’m a prude also. I was always taught not to talk about it.

There is no perfect or crowning stage of life.

You are either interesting, or you are not, no matter how old you are.

I do like to look back on how and where I lived my earlier life; I often try to recall the people who pushed me or helped me launch the most important hopes and elements of my life. I wish I could still thank them. I would like to be one of them.

But it doesn’t work for me to recall the joys and dark days of my life; that seems to go nowhere but down for me. Youth was never the high point of my life; it was, in fact, one of the worst times of my life.

I am happier than I ever was as a kid; something that still shocks me and makes little sense at times. At age 79, I am much better, happier, and busier. There is absolutely no sense in wishing to be what I was or lamenting what I was not. I am no wizard, but I know things. I should hope so.

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My self-run report card is in the now. There is a thin, sometimes creepy, line between memory and nostalgia; I try to spend little time on either. My life centers on who I am now, not who I was or wished to be. Truly, there isn’t time.

Memories can inspire me, teach me, or push me into the future. Nostalgia is sinking into the past for me, and I assume my recollections are accurate, though I think many are not.

The melancholy – and self-pity and complaint – of nostalgia is not a guide or partner in old age.

To me, nostalgia is what kills romance. It is a poison of aging comfortably. I often hear complaints about life, children, politics; it always used to be better. I don’t think so.

Romance is also different from love; romance is one of those words I see all over the place, but there is no real consensus on what it means. Some consider it only as a reference to a deep emotional attraction between individuals.

The word has a much richer history than that; there are dozens of distinctly different definitions across relationships, history, and mystery. It is a much deeper idea to me.

I like to think of it this way: Although my life was often unhappy, I was always in love with life and its possibilities. I love my wife deeply, but I also see romance in nature, freedom, creativity, even in flower pictures. I knew it could always be better.

That was and is a romantic feeling for me, something I feel when I step outside and see the clouds in the deep blue sky.

Romance has grown up with me and followed me into old age, where it lives fully, tries to do some good, and accepts the future. It’s not really fully describable – it’s a feeling.

I ran into a friend of mine, even younger, today, who looked at me and said, “Isn’t old age horrible for us?” He is having a rough time medically.

I honestly didn’t know what to say to him. I mumbled something about being happy, but he wasn’t listening.

The romance had been drained from him by some health trouble. I wondered why he said “us.” We aren’t all the same. I don’t think old age is horrible for “us.” Will I? Should I? I hope not.

Maria calls me a romantic. I like that.

Small acts of great kindness are the words I use when I think about romance.

I hope I never lose it.