He has made everything beautiful in its time.
—Ecclesiastes 3:11
A young person plunges enthusiastically into an imagined future.
An older person plunges with equal enthusiasm into an exaggerated past.
Those who think imagination belongs only to the young are badly mistaken. Creativity has a way of crowning the past with glory. In our later years, fantasy runs wild. We grayheads even love to talk about our past misfortunes. We can take a mundane experience of the past and add dramatic details that we’ve convinced ourselves really happened when they really didn’t.
“To make a long story short” is the preamble of many conversations. But, with age, we learn how to make a short story long.
To hijack Browning’s words: “Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, the last of life for which the first was made.”
Old age has its advantages.