Counting Down to 90 - Week 1579

A man said to the universe:

“Sir, I exist!”

“However,” replied the universe,

“The fact has not created in me

A sense of obligation.”

A Man Said to the Universe

By Stephen Crane

I keep using this to remind myself that in the end, the universe does not care about anything I do or write or have to say. And yet, here I am with a new post and a new column.

I wanted to wait till my birthday to start this column but…“we have no control over the two most important events in our lives…our birth and our death” and similarly, we will reach one-year milestones of being alive, whether we like it or not…if a birthday is a passive event that we will attain as long as we are alive, then today is as good a day as any to start. 

There is no doubt that a birthday is a big deal culturally. A birthday is a time to celebrate the fact that you have reached a specific age, a time to reflect on what you have done over those years and a time and an excuse to get together with friends and family.

And yet…while reaching 60 with mind and body reasonably intact is an achievement I am proud of, I no longer have the enthusiasm I once had for celebrating the day I was born. I remember throwing head-banging parties for my 40th, 45th and 50th. I have no intention of doing anything like that on my 60th and other birthdays, except perhaps to spend some extended time with close family.

In the end, each one must decide what they want to do with their birthdays. Whether to celebrate them with a bang or quietly or not, or to spend time reflecting or be away…to each their own.

So what is this all about?

I first started a writing site www.manfrommatunga.com way back in June 1999, almost 25 years ago. The first post was titled “Of Sitcoms”, and I have reposted this here with a little bit more about the history of that site. I have been writing in various forms on various sites for the last 25 years. Some of what I have written is now available at bhavinj.com, but a lot of the other stuff is just archived at the Wayback Machine and over the next few years, I hope to bring everything into bhavinj.com. 

I do not think I can ever write on a daily basis, unlike Dave Winer, who celebrated 30 years of non-stop daily writing on his blog last week. However, I do want to document the remaining 30 years of my life till I reach the age of 90 in the year 2055, assuming that is my lifespan. I have already lived 2/3rds of it and had a ball doing so, and I hope that the next 30 years will be fun, fulfilling and purposeful in equal measures. Chances are I may live even longer, but we will see how things go after the age of 90. 

As of today, I have 1579 weeks left till the day I turn 90 and the idea is to countdown to 90 using this number.

A glimmer of this idea came to me when I was writing a post titled “The Retirement Conundrum: Managing the Remaining 1500 Weeks” for my Atmasvasth blog. This post was a take on Oliver Burkemann’s book, “4000 Weeks: Time Management for Mortals”. Ten months later, this idea has finally germinated. 

I am sure the writing will change over the next 30 years. I am not sure if the platform I use - Ghost - will still be around. Nor am I sure what form or shape the Internet will be in 30 years from now. I will keep changing things depending on what happens, but what I do foresee is that email will be around, even if other forms of communication are not. So please do subscribe, if a weekly post from me, typically on a Sunday, is of interest to you.