how have you aged?

[Gandalf]

Nothing terrible on the outside. I got a haircut today and I am more gray at the sides. I'm getting to the stage now where I don't care so much. You get older and you spend more of your life old than young, so you might as well get used to it. I was born old anyway.

By 'nothing terrible on the outside', what are you implying has happened to you inside the skin? For me, I'm certainly more perverted and open to ogling than I was when I was younger.

I would answer that in two ways. Last winter I got pretty sick and I realised that my 'body as machine' liberal approach to life was becoming a dead end and it meant a full on self revolution. I have had lapses, but I know I cannot eat or drink like I did and not pay a penalty. I think mentally I have aged too. In some ways it is good as I read and think a little bit differently, but by the same token my perceptions of mankind are pretty bleak.

When you are younger you are invincible and think the world can change, as you get older you realise yourself and the world are pretty far gone. All that talk of progress was lies as the system decays and they beat the drums of war again and again and again until it becomes an ache in the head that you wish would go away. 'Oh, but she said something racist!' they cry on Twitter and children chase monsters into roads and the bombs continue to fall in wars we all started. We are not at a good point. If you are not jaded, you are likely dead. All you can do is make sure you don't add to the burden of a dying world.