Ten-Year Plan

In the spring of 1980, confidence ran through my veins as I sat across from the manager who would later select me as Payroll Supervisor at Newport News Shipbuilding. His gaze was steady, his question simple: “Where do you see yourself in ten years?” I met his challenge with a touch of youthful ambition. “I would like to be sitting where you are right now,” I said, not knowing then the ways in which time would reshape the bravado of that answer. His approving smile is still vivid in my memory—an affirmation in a world that, at 39, I felt I could shape at will.

Now, in July 2025, at age 84, finds me asking a far different question, one that feels heavier and more contemplative: Where do I see myself in ten years? The optimism of youth has been replaced by the clarity of experience. Statistics offer little comfort, just a 19% chance of reaching age 94. Most days that number rings hollow; I had hoped the odds would give me a promise rather than a warning. Yet the reality is unavoidable: there is an 81% chance I will not see that milestone birthday.

So, what does it mean to plan for the future when most of your years are behind you? To reach 90, the odds improve—46%, nearly a coin toss. Not the reassurance I once sought in life’s earlier decades, but perhaps enough to justify hope for a little more time.

My mind turns, as it often does, to the question of how these odds might be nudged upward. Could small acts—a few less pounds carried, a few more steps taken—yield more time? The first hopeful step is to lighten the load, to relieve my aging body of the burden it has silently borne. Maybe if I succeed, the 60% odds are within reach.

To strive for 70% feels audacious, perhaps even naïve, and yet the thought pushes me forward. A lengthened walk—perhaps five miles instead of the familiar three and a half. Another ten minutes in the gym, chasing not youth, but endurance. These are modest ambitions, but at this stage, meaningful ones.

And then there is the less tangible, but crucial factor: community. My retirement village circle is wide, an unexpected blessing—fifty friends, 150 acquaintances, and, counting family and old friends, nearly 300 people to remind me I am not walking this road alone. Connection, I have read, lifts spirits and extends lives. Perhaps together we can outwit time—if only for a while longer. Could that sense of belonging stretch my chances to 80%? It is a comforting notion.

Still, I sense you might wonder why an old man lingers so on the future, why I strive for years most men never see. My answer is simple, though deeply felt. I want to witness the unfolding stories of those I love. To watch my great-granddaughters stride across a college graduation stage, to see them build families of their own; to watch my granddaughters discover happiness; to see my daughter’s dreams, so long nurtured, finally come true. And above all, I hope to spare my wife the loneliness that would follow my absence. The years I seek are for them as much as for me.

Perhaps then, a ten-year plan is more than I can reasonably claim. But a six-year plan—well, that feels almost attainable. I know the things I might try, the steps I hope to take. I remain acutely aware that I’ve crossed beyond my expected years—my “expiration date,” as it were, was age 79—and I am grateful for every moment I’ve been given since.

As I move forward, I resolve to savor what time allows, squeezing joy and gratitude from each day. For I have learned—sometimes painfully, always humbly—that growing old is not simply the accumulation of years, but the deepening of wisdom. Every wrinkle has become a chapter, every year a gift, every moment a new beginning shaped by yesterday’s lessons.

Perhaps in recording these thoughts, I am speaking as much to myself as to anyone else. Putting pen to paper reveals the shape of my hopes and fears. If these words resonate, if they bring solace or clarity to even one person wrestling with the passage of time, then their purpose is fulfilled.