I scribbled down a few thoughts about wrinkles back in early 2015. Yes, wrinkles. During the years up to that point, I’ve been noticing how much people yearn for youth and beauty, and started to think about what would it mean if I had wrinkles. The way I saw it then, having wrinkles would mean I’ve lived long and that I haven’t died in an accident or from disease too early. The shape of wrinkles would also indicate if I’ve smiled or frowned a lot. I really want the wrinkles from smiling.
I was onto something by hinting at the importance of how my time was spent, but couldn’t put it nicely in a short form. Then this year I read On the shortness of life by Seneca, a Roman philosopher. He wrote in the essay:
There’s no reason to believe that someone has lived long because he has gray hair and wrinkles: he’s not lived long but long existed.