Oh, Brent! So sorry to hear that. My mum died a couple years back, and I'm still not over that.

If you need somebody to talk to, I'm usually around.

Yes, but now you have a different "life-job".

You know about Greek philosophers. Serious mental undertakings weren't done until one had the age and wisdom to appreciate the full impact. After passing through immoral youth into mortal adulthood.

You can now begin to examine your own life, and pass on what you have learned to those who are younger. From a mortal point of view.

An example: Your DIY skills. Your cooking skills.

Those are learned, and those are some things you can pass on to others. One of those "give a man a fish, you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime" things.

Instead of being the renegade horse running free resisting reins, you now become the rider of the horse. Trying to direct where you want to go.

You get to marvel and enjoy the youth and pass on bits of advice. Even if it's silly stuff to strangers, it's still a small life lesson that will allow them to fish...

Like a young lad who was adjusting his backpack after loading it up with food and beverages from the store. I could hear bottles clanking. I told him to be very careful, because the tendency is to drop the backpack, or let it fall, and the bottle(s?) lying on their sides at the bottom of the backpack will break.

He responded in youth lingo "Thanks for the heads" (giggle) and really seemed to appreciate the bit of advice from some old woman.

Or the time I burst out laughing at the young men that had gone to the picnic table to sit down and didn't check it for moisture...the one guy got a wet butt, because the sprinklers had been on. How many times did I do that in my restless impetuous youth? Hahaha. Anyway, I said it's so important to check for moisture on ANYTHING, even if looks dry. Lawns that look dry on the surface could well be muck at ground level. And freshly mown lawns can be awful for grass stains. Tree trunks, plastic chairs at cafes, even fast food places someone might have spilt a drink.

Be older is fun too. You get to say things to people, and it doesn't always creep them out. LOL! You aren't a rival to the younger kids. You aren't a threat. So they will listen more often. Like they might not listen to their own parents, because they are PARENTS, but they would listen to you, an uninvolved neutral party.

I've had lots of discussions with younger folks online. Sometimes they have asked my age and been in horror finding out I was their mom's age. To which I reply that how often have they talked to their mum like a person, not a parent?

You have a massive amount of experience to draw from, life experience. All that stuff you would like to fix that you broke, well, you go on to try to help others NOT to break it.

Your do-over comes in the form of other people. Of course, you can't make them do it right, LOL. But you can pass on what you know.

After my mum died, there was so much stuff to go through. And she had so many nice things, like a nice dining set, china, crystal, wool rugs, etc. I took none of that. Because I know MYSELF now that *I* am older. I know that I could not keep those things as nice as she did. My life is very different. I would rather have those things go to someone who would appreciate them, who would treasure them, who is capable of taking care of them than to have them go to me where I don't have room and they would get wrecked.

It's a kind of lack of selfishness and more of giving, it seems, with aging. At least for me.

Time is the most precious gift you can give.

And I have a lot of time, every day, all day. I'm disabled and I'm very aware of what I can and can't do. I can't give to society in the same way that you might be able to, by doing a job, providing a service. My time is pretty much wasted on tribe.net, but I like to give time to those who don't have any. And to those who don't have the money to hire someone to do whatever it is that I do for them.

It's ALL connected.

There's a line in Pink Floyd's Time that I'm always reminding myself of

"10 years have got behind you, no one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun..."