My watch, an old Suunto, has a function that tells how far above sea level you are. It can also count the number of ski runs you have done and calculate the total downhill distance. Another function gives the barometric pressure, useful for predicting changes in the weather. The digital compass can help keep you on course. It also tells the time and date - 11:04 AM, 17 June, 2012 - which means I am now 65 years old.
"Yet there is something ominous in turning 65," wrote Colleen McCullough in The Thorn Birds, a must-read novel of Australia. "Suddenly old age is not a phenomenon which will occur: it has occurred."
I don't feel old. I don't look ancient either. The hieroglyphs of scars and wrinkles tell quite a story. But there is no way I can slow down my watch. The clock keeps ticking. Loudly.
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day Till the last syllable of recorded time.
