I want to live until the following events occur:
- Adult diapers.
- Alzheimer’s.
- Any other sort of dementia that would destroy my mind.
- Excruciating pain from cancer of any sort.
- Any illness that decreases the quality of my life to the point living is no longer a gift but is a burden.
I’ve always said that one’s quality of life is more important than the quantity of it.
On Aging with an Attitude I put it this way:
When I’ve lost the ability to go to the bathroom by myself without the aid of diapers, when I don’t recognize my friends anymore, it’s time to go. I’ve often said that I wanted to go before my husband, but truly, he needs to go before me. He’s helpless. He’s the greatest attorney in the world, but he’s never paid a bill online or ordered anything from Amazon.
I don’t want to live without him. We’re coming up on fifty years of being together. He is my everything.
‘Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.“
W H Auden
