THE RULE OF LIFE

A MAN’S MORTALITY IS AN ISSUE BEST LEFT UNMEASURED AND FIRMLY PLANTED IN DENIAL

Folks, a mate recently used a metre rule to show me just how much time he had left on Earth.

I asked him to immediately pay back all the money he owes me.

Holding one finger on the 86cm mark, he slid his other index finger up the rule until it hit his current age. This left a shockingly small gap.

“If I’m lucky, I reckon that’s how long I’ve got left to live,” he announced.

Frankly, I thought 86 was being a little optimistic.

He’s a true son of his generation. He does practically no exercise, has too much sugar, high iron, is overweight, likes a drink or 19, has a shot back, knees and possibly several other undiagnosed issues he refuses to see a doctor about. Come to think of it, I’m surprised he’s lasted this long.

On the plus side, he doesn’t get sick very easily and is in a job that isn’t exactly stressing him out too much physically, emotionally or mentally. Things could be much worse.

Then he slid his finger back to my age. “Barring illness or accident, you’ve got just over 30 years to go,” he said.

“You’re well and truly over the halfway mark of your life. How’s that working out for you?”

In the glum silence that followed we both took stock of the state of our lives, then had another beer. Eventually I piped up.

“Hopefully, by the time I’m your age they’ll have found a cure for all the things lining up to kill you,” I said.

He shook his head, “Mate, you’re well and truly living in a river in Egypt,” he said.

He didn’t mention that I wasn’t the only one in denial.

We men don’t like to ponder our mortality. That’s the sort of thinking that can stop us from having all sorts of fun.

Still, we both agreed there was no point procrastinating, we definitely had to do something and we had to do it straight away.

Which was how the metre rule ended up being broken up and used as firewood.