Too Old for This

by Samantha Downing

You can’t live and not have regrets. Some call them life lessons and try to figure out what they’ve learned from each experience. That’s well and good, but you’ll always wish you hadn’t done it in the first place.

Judgment is one of those things you can feel before you know what it is.

Yes, people put their interests ahead of others’, even in times of tragedy. Accident, illness, missing child—it doesn’t matter. Self-interest always takes precedence. The people who are supposed to help, who get paid to help, will still choose themselves.

When most of your life has been lived, you turn to the next phase. What will you be remembered for? Or will you be remembered at all? What is enough to leave behind? Is a child enough? One child? More than one? And how do the grandkids figure into it? If I leave behind two generations of kids and grandkids that knew me, is that enough to make sure I’m remembered?

People say they want the truth, and they believe they want it. But it’s a lie. Nine times out of ten, if you know what’s good for you, the last thing you want is the truth. What you want, what we all want, is the story we believe in. And it’s probably a lie.