You're listening to a special archive presentation of TED Talks Daily. This talk features novelist and essayist Anne Lamont, recorded live at TED 2017.

My seven-year-old grandson sleeps just down the hall from me, and he wakes up a lot of mornings, and he says, you know, this could be the best day

ever. And other times, in the middle of the night, he calls out in a tremulous voice,

Nana, will you ever get sick and die? I think this pretty much says it for me and most of the

people I know that we're a mixed grill of happy anticipation

and dread. So I sat down a few days before my 61st birthday, and I decided to compile a list of

everything I know for sure. There's so little truth in the popular culture, and it's good to be sure of a few things.

For instance, I am no longer 47,

although this is the age I feel

and the age I like to think of myself as being.

My friend Paul used to say in his late 70s

that he felt like a young man was something

really wrong with him.

Our true person is outside of time and space, but looking at the paperwork, I can in fact see

that I was born in 1954. My inside self is outside of time and space.

It doesn't have an age.

I'm every age I've ever been, and so are you.

Although I can't help mentioning as an aside

that it might have been helpful if I hadn't followed

the skincare rules of the 60s,

which involved getting as much sun as possible,

well, slathered in baby oil,

...