Yesterday, my wife and I happened to watch a YouTube video about Sae Awatsuji, a designer and doll artist. Ninety-two years old. She was in fine form right from the start. She wondered aloud whether she might live another five years. At 92, she is still looking five years ahead. That alone struck me as wonderful. I do not think longevity itself is the purpose of life. Living longer is not necessarily what matters. But watching her, I could see that she had reached 92 while enjoying everyday...

In the past three years, I have said goodbye to three members of my family.Most recently, it was my father. There is something dramatic about death.The everyday life that had carried on until then suddenly ends. Family members gather, decisions must be made, and time passes in a blur. After a while, it becomes a very quiet memory. I had not seen my father all that often.Once every month or two. More recently, I had been driving my mother to the hospital each month, so I would see him then. My...

My father died. Three years ago he got colon cancer, and even after they removed his entire colon and he was down to skin and bone, he recovered enough to walk on his own just three weeks after the surgery — and then, just like that, he was gone. He was eighty-three. The way he died, the phrase "a slow suicide" comes to mind. Not in a negative sense, but as proof that he had lived enough. For the last two or three months, he would nod off without realizing it, even sitting on the sofa.He ate...