5 Weeks: Longevity

I was thinking this afternoon about how, with good luck and good medicine, August might well live to see the year 2100. That this could reasonably happen sort of blows my mind. If this were the case, the span of time from my birth to his death would be 135 years... that's a far cry from what people might have expected 100 years ago. If I had been in 1865, rather than 1965, my life expectancy might have been less than 45 years, and I'd likely have had kids in my early-to-mid twenties, rather than my early forties. So if I had a child at age 25 and lived to 45, the span of time from my birth to the end of a child's life would be 65 years: less than half the number we're contemplating today.

Is it any wonder there seems to be a widening generation gap when we're waiting longer than ever to have kids, and the rate of societal and technological change is more rapid than ever? Of course, that assumes societal change is more rapid now than it was in, say, the 60's and 70's. That "times are a-changin'" ever more rapidly seems to be a generally accepted notion these days, but hasn't it always been? More importantly, is it true? I don't think August's world will be as alien to me as mine was to my dad's.

On a completely unrelated note, to temper this ambling, ponderous post, here's a photo of me holding a goo baby in the Bjorn. This is a strategy we've been using to calm him down... walking around the apartment this way. More on why this has become necessary in a future post.