The best excuse for why I’ve been silent since spring is that the sun came back to Vermont and I’ve done everything I can to enjoy it. In Vermont, you spend eight months of the year waiting for summer to return.

Many Vermont summer days seem too perfect for an imperfect human like me to be part of them. They make me feel like a hideaway who, if discovered, will be kicked out. Tossed back to a land where the sun doesn’t flicker through the trees and the birds don’t chirp so musically. When I walk on these pristine days I let my mind meander.

On one such walk, I pondered growing old. I have a very vivid memory from elementary school. I was looking at the high schoolers and I thought, “I will never live to be as old as they are.” Yet, I did grow as old as they were. Not only that, I lived through college. And now I’m just a few years from 30 and I’m still living happily.

Some people fear getting old. Others complain about it. Others dye their hair and refused to tell you their age, as if time can be stopped through censorship. Recently, old people keep bursting into my thoughts. Many of my friends in Paraguay were more than twice my age. Most of the patients I transport to the hospital (I’m an EMT) were alive during WWII. My grandfather—the one who always made me laugh and was a humble, hidden source of strength—died. He’s still in my heart.

I thought about these elderly people as I walked. A slight breeze brushed away the mosquitoes and it smelled like grass and green things. I thought, “I’ll probably be 90 one day. What the heck will I be doing when I’m 90?”

I tried to envision what it would be like to be one of the white haired, wrinkly, and wise people who are always stoically at the edges of my life. For a moment, the thought made me sad. But, the melancholy passed and I grew calm. I would likely be old one day. And when that time came, I would not be busy like I am now.

It wouldn’t be that bad being old. I’d sit on a porch somewhere watching the sun shine. Perhaps I’d still be flexible enough to lie in a hammock. I’d observe the young people zooming around and they’d wonder how I wasn’t bored sitting and staring at the world all day. I would be so occupied by memories of a lifetime and all the family, friends, and acquaintances whose stories I’d shared that sitting on a porch would be like being at a movie theater watching the best movie ever. The best movie because I was its writer, producer, star, audience, and critic.

Sometimes young people would pause long enough to talk to me. They might be my grandchildren or they might be someone else’s grandchildren. I’d talk about what I’d done, seen, and learned. My words would fall on deaf ears but, sometime later, those young people would remember something I said and it would help them.

As I walked thinking about being ancient I realized that I was content with time passing. I’d make it as far as I was supposed to go. The grandest part of the whole thing, the beauty of aging, was that my weakening state would leave me no option but to reflect. My frail bones would limit the history I could make in my last few years, and that wouldn’t be so terrible. It’s meant to be that way. It’s meant to be that we have some time to enjoy what has been and is without any need to build the future.