May 8, 2026 l The Manila Times
My UP high school class of 1972 held a party dubbed “Prep 72 turns 70” to celebrate our 70th birthdays with a biblical reference from Psalm 90:10: “The days of our lives are seventy years, yet their boast is only labor and sorrow, for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.”
The passage teaches us to appreciate the fragile and fleeting nature of life. It also wants us to gain a healthy appreciation of our mortality.
As friends for almost 60 years, our batch experienced the long march of time, and we’ve observed that it flies more quickly now. Perhaps this is because of our growing acceptance that life is finite and time is running out.
We are clearly past mid-life and can no longer linger in trivial crises that mid-lifers indulge in. We have to address the challenges that confront us with the remaining time we have.
We comfort ourselves with the thought that 80 is the new 70. If we stay healthy, we might still make it to this next threshold and, if lucky, beyond that. After all, we are still quite active and still drinking too much beer at the party.
Some of us, especially the doctors, are still working full time. We recognized that our bodies are no longer the same though, and talked about the signs.
Our bones are starting to creak, our joints stiffer in the mornings, and we take supplements in an attempt to delay the inevitable. We no longer have the stamina of our youth. We miss this and can only reminisce on this memory.
In my bike rides, I can hardly keep up on uphill climbs that were easy for me just a couple of years ago. We counted ourselves lucky, though, that we did not have more of these E.D.A.D. maladies.
Many classmates and friends had moved on. Some had passed, while others migrated to provinces and abroad to be with families, shrinking our social circles.
We realized that we need to actively engage with our remaining friends, while also wanting to make new ones. This is important, because many of us are empty nesters as our children pursue dreams of their own. We simply cannot sit at home and allow loneliness to seep in.
With time running out, we look back on unfulfilled plans and paths that we did not take. Rediscovering mortality is actually a motivator to pursue activities that we missed.
As our careers wind down, we are finding new life purposes as we wake up in the morning. We are discovering new roles. We also realize that we have been preparing for these new roles our entire lives.
Some of us are full-time volunteers in various activities, others are travelling to exotic destinations with their remaining energy and savings, a number are taking management advisory positions, and the rest are taking their roles as grandparents seriously.
We are reinventing retirement so that we can last for another 20 years, but retirement may be the wrong word to describe these remaining years. It is simply another stage of life that our generation got as a bonus. It would be madness not to take advantage of it.
Getting old is a challenge, but we are grateful for this privilege that is denied to many. It remains to be an opportunity for growth, learning and self-discovery.
As we look back on our triumphs and failures, we embrace the persons that we have become and remain hopeful that we can become even better persons than we were before.
***The views expressed herein are his own and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of his office as well as FINEX. For comments, email rsgoseco@gmail.com. Photo is from Pinterest.