Many parents are loathe to expect children to take care of them. Many would prefer, insofar as is possible to be as small a burden on anyone, especially on their own children, in their old age. Ironically those sorts of people may wind up least lonely of all, while those who gave the least in love may want the most of it. But who knows these things when you’re 25? Paul Simon once wondered whether it would be “terribly strange to be 70″. To some extent we carry the strangeness with us.

Oh when you were young
Did you question all the answers
Did you envy all the dancers
Who had all the nerve?