If I read the first page of a long novel and then read the next and the next, flipping each page on top of the first until it is buried under precept and circumstance, and occurrence, the first page is still the same. It hasn’t changed. This is how I feel. I am older, years go by adding precept and circumstance, and occurrence on top of the original text, but I that first page remains the same. I don’t feel that different. Just added to. Or buried under, depending on the mood. When I was a young person, I looked at older people and assumed they were older inside too. As if the consciousness and perception aged with the body. When I was young, both my mind and my body were supple. They seemed harmonious and unified. In my middle age, there is a tendency to feel like my mind and my body are both warn and grooved and degenerated. But there are also times when I my perception and my physicality are disconnected. In these times I do not feel harmoniously related to the condition of my body. These times are dangerous. This is when I am likely to jump on some kids skateboard and think I can do something I can’t any more. It is very easy to embarrass myself and act a fool under such a disconnect. So I, being naturally hesitant to make an obvious fool of myself, (a hesitancy the universe loves nothing more than to exploit for a good laugh) do much in the form of restraining myself by “acting my age”. Doing this to save face promotes the perception to youth around me that growing older is both physical and consciousness based.