In which I evade future manslaughter charges and accidentally make my home safer for old people. My first task in the boot camp challenge was to upgrade my apartment for old age. Most people (I suspect) want to stay in their own homes until the day they die. We want to live independently, and if independence […]
Continue reading
In which the jabbering residents of my interior rest home duke it out. I’ve got my very own rest home inside my skull, with at least five residents. When I try to Think with a capital T about how to prepare for growing old, their voices drown me out. Jabber jabber jabber! Depressa: It’s […]
Continue reading
I am forever amazed at the barrage of self-help material urging us to aim for the top, follow our dreams, and especially to be better than everyone else. Just a minute: how can everyone be the best? I figured out the maths around 1972, when New Zealand’s favourite poet, Sam Hunt, told me that female poets (unlike male poets) […]
Continue reading
In which I contemplate the relative scariness of a first pregnancy and old age. Preparing for old age is the scariest thing I have ever done in my life. Scarier than gliding. Scarier than windsurfing in a gale. Scarier than reading poems to an audience of 2000. Scarier than reading poems to the […]
Continue reading
In which I bully myself into making 12 lifestyle changes in a single year, to increase my health and happiness in old age and reduce the chances of getting dementia. This is an account of my personal boot camp to prepare myself for the extra years—the bonus years that we never expected or desired—the years […]
Continue reading