Okay, when I busted brain chubby I was close to the big 4-0. I was getting a little stiff in the joints and maybe, maybe the eyes were getting a little fuzzy. But since the eruption I'm feeling fine and fucking dandy.Now, a bunch of y'all are really fucking young. You ain't never gonna have to deal with the grey hairs or the creaking knees.And it doesn't mean a fucking thing to any of you, does it?

I'm not old enough to vote; I don't have the experience to even think about that properly. I mean, short of a mentalist dropping the experience straight into my brain, I can't feel anything about it, other than in a rhetorical way.

I wasn't quite that old when I popped, Bill, but I feel you. I had settled into what I thought was going to be "life", complete with arthritis starting to get into my hands, gray hair around the temples, and a rod I generally had to coax into action. These days, I've got the metabolism of an eighteen year-old and none of the appetites to match. Good for work, but bad the rest of the time. All I do is sit around being fucking bored all day, where before my time off was barely enough to recover.

You kids don't have a damn clue how good you've got it.

It's funny, but at 26 years old I was starting to feel like one of the "old folks" around here. All of a sudden I realize how wrong I was.
This thread isn't going to be all about how "youth is wasted on the young", is it?

Seventeen here, have no idea what you old people are talking about. Still, I won't live forever. Maybe the onset of old age and its effects will still be there, just delayed?

I'm guessing yes. It will just take longer. I mean... we're not immortal, right? Novas have been killed before.

I go in for a checkup with some of DeVries' paraphysicians on a monthly basis. I am all but certain that they run far more tests than are strictly necassary, but that's beside the point. Anyway, they tell me that my body is most definitely showing internal signs of aging, it's just that it hasn't caught up with my outward, physical appearance yet. Apparently the effects of aging they have detected are also somewhat warped or retarded, so they fully expect that I will live for a very long time yet, but they say that it will probably take several more years of testing and observation before they'll have any clear idea of what my actual life expectancy will be.

Ageless isn't the same thing as immortal, ya know. I don't suppose any novas HAVE died of old age yet? I mean, it's a bit early to call...

Coming up on thirty here. ... Jesus, I'm gonna be thirty.

But the perception that novas are ageless - or rather, that all novas are ageless - is a bit inaccurate. Novas, especially ones with enhanced stamina, do have a longer projected lifespan. About double the normal lifespan, was the last estimate I read.

Lifespans for all humans are on the rise, really. They don't get as much press as the cures for breast cancer or Alzheimer's, but science has made great strides in prolonged lifespan over the past decade. Right now there is legislation being proposed in Congress to raise the age of retirement, which I have mixed feelings about - but, I'm not going to be in this country for too much longer, so I suppose I'm worrying over nothing.

It's interesting, with the research regarding the function of cell produced free-radicals and the aging that results, why hasn't one of us as of yet figured a way to PREVENT aging period.

Killed yeah. But I lived a lot of my life figuring I was gonna die gutshot or stabbed. Or mebbe strung out at one point. I was just getting used to the idea I may die in bed and not in the good way.

Now I don't gotta worry about that. Docs say they don't have any clue as to whether or not I'm even aging anymore.