If you were going to live forever, how would you live today?
Being an Immortalist is complicated.
The doctor’s advice to me at 25 has to mean as much as if I were 45, or 55, or 95. Too much “hot dish” (in Iowa we call this a casserole), donuts and Coca Cola now means diabetes later, and I don’t intend to live out eternity on insulin injections, worrying about losing digits to bad circulation. Not enough exercise now means bone and muscle loss later, and I don’t intend to spend eternity staring at the ground because I’m too stooped with osteoporosis to do otherwise. Too much stress now means high blood pressure later–and a lot of headaches now–so that one definitely has to go.
Being an Immortalist is inconvenient.
If I’m going to live forever, an oil spill on the Gulf Coast that destroys an entire ecosystem–plants, animals, and all the people making a living off the aforementioned–hits me where I live. I become aware of the money I’ve poured down the gulping throat of Big Oil because I didn’t want to ride a bike or, God forbid, walk wherever I’m going.
Being an Immortalist is worth it.
I will be vivid and vivacious. I will come, see and conquer. Otherwise, what’s the point?
My immortality is under threat, not only by my own destructive choices, but by the destructive choices of our nation and our world.
“Something’s gonna get you,” may be true, but must we poke Something in the eye with a stick until it attacks?
If we’re going to live forever, we can’t. And I, for one, intend to live forever.
If I am going to live forever…
The time has come to make a change. Maybe just a series of small changes. It all adds up.
I will get and stay fit. I will eat plants. I will limit my intake of animal products and refined, well, anything. I will drink water. I will bask in sunlight. I will do all these things because I want to live.
I will turn off the light when I leave the room. I will turn off the water while I’m brushing my teeth. I will support local agriculture. I will promote alternative energy. I will make a hell of a lot of noise about the organizations that don’t. I will do all these things because I want other living things–trees, tomatoes, dogs, people, you–to live too.
What use is immortality if it’s spent all alone?