Nobody asked but …
When I was below the age of five, I was not expected to do physically demanding things, such as hod carrying or bicycle riding. I was not required to do things that required experience or problem solving skills. I was not held responsible for things that were assigned competence levels. Some of these institutional hold harmless agreements stayed in place until my voice changed, or I reached 16 years of age, then 18, then 21. I had to reach 35 to be held out of selective service eligibility, or to serve as POTUS. Lastly, I ran into a smattering of bedraggled annualizations which marked my being eligible for lifelong learning, senior discounts, early retirement, regular retirement, extended retirement, and various age-related, statist benefit programs.
Maybe when we become superannuated, we should have reversed our trajectory a la Benjamin Button. Our competencies are not so easily misperceived when we are wet behind the ears. Although the spirit is still willing, the body becomes weaker everyday … and the spirit begins to follow. I am getting smaller. I am getting weaker. I am more susceptible to adversity. I am more weary of the constraints that other generations impose — see TSA, the cartelization of education, and air travel in general.
Why is there not a lessening of responsibility as we re-approach infantility? Why? The arrow of time has not been reversed. Consequences at time B must be arising from human action at time A.
— Kilgore Forelle
