One of my childhood friends used to cry in her birthdays, saying that she was sad that she was one year closer to dying. I’ve been thinking about that lately. You might think it’s a simple case of the glass half full or half empty paradox. Which I certainly did for a while. But I’ve come to think that we aren’t necessarily dying just because we are living for one more day. Dying to me refers to organs or bodily functions shutting down. Are we to say that over the next year, everyone’s organs or functions are deteriorating? What about a one year old child, whose brain and skeletal systems and strengthening and creating more complex networks, is dying because they will soon turn two?
That too. What does it mean to live, is it about physiology or is experience? Because if it’s about experience, then we aren’t dying until we decide we won’t do anything anymore. Or at least until we decide we won’t do anything stimulating anymore. Which to me is impossible if not for someone deciding they’ll just breathe and stay immobile for the rest of their life.
Putative: another word for “supposed”, describes something that is hypothesized. For example, the putative free food was no where to be found.
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