I'm very much a 20th century man. I have some of the trappings of the 21st century but I will always be a product of the times I grew up in. Not to be misunderstood, I am grateful to have seen two centuries and many great and wonderful things.
My father, on the other hand, was born and lived out his life within the past century. I'll always remember him watching the moon landing on TV and saying "I was born before the Wright Brothers flew and now I'm watching men walk on the moon". This is the kind of thing that shapes our lives.
You know, the happiest and the most difficult times of our lives are the memories that never escape us. As I have said before, at my age I go to a lot of funerals. I should also mention that I have visited many friends in hospital and nursing home beds. There's nothing so humbling as watching someone your own age, wasting away.
Let me give my younger audience at tip. When doctors, nurses, or nursing home attendants tell you "we're just going to try and get a bit of meat on your bones so you can go back home", get in touch with hospice if you had planned to finish your days in your own home. Get back home right away or you may never see it again.
Now, as for the old plan of whooping it up through life and then having a death bed conversion; forget it. You will be too busy with the battle for life and avoiding death, trying not to admit that once is fading and the other nearing. In other words, denial hits heavily, and if you have nothing in place to turn to, it may be too late.
You can take this or leave it, that's entirely up to you. All I know is every time I visit a friend in that shape, the nurses have them more concerned with evacuating their bowels than getting their spiritual house in order. We are born into eternity and it comes to us all, no matter the century.
That's my opinion and you're entitled to it.
Griz