My mother turns 90 tomorrow, a ripe old age even by modern standards. In some ways its remarkable that she has made it so far given the many health challenges she has faced over the 10 years. I know that looming large in her thoughts was the fact that her mother, my grandmother, died quite young at 60. Strokes tended to kill in those days and had modern medicine been available, she may well have lived a much longer life. Her loss was a great blow to my mum, for it left her alone and far from her land of birth. It is a testimony to her fortitude that she stuck with it and raised five boys. So tomorrow is an anniversary of many sorts.

I cannot shake from my own thoughts (though it is only tangentially related to the previous paragraph) that humans are not long for this world. It might be just a feeling, a part of my occasional melancholic reflection on the state of things, but is is informed by much wider reading over many years. It is therefore not just a feeling, but an educated guess, which stays with me.

I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight
I got from looking through a pane of glass
I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough
And held against the world of hoary grass.

Frost had apples in his sight and thoughts of the apple harvest, but I suspect at some deeper level, we are alike in our feelings about the modern world. Are there enough thoughtful and energised people to stop the rot? I don't know.