Or: They don’t Make them like they used to!
We had to buy a new dryer today. It was almost exactly the same as the old one, but somehow smaller. For our old dryer, we bought a 3-year warranty and didn’t renew it because it was still working. It lasted 5 years. Therefore, when we purchased the new one, we bought the 5-year warranty for it. We tried to get a repair guy to fix the last one but it would have cost more to fix it than replace it. And he charged us $134.00 just to look at it! Sad, but true. They have to make a living, too. I realize that there are more electronics in these new appliances than before and there is less metal and more plastic with cheaper materials inside. You would still think that they would last a little longer than 5 years! I read this interesting article on why modern appliances don’t last as long as their predecessors. There is less competition and also less quality control so the new product is not like the old ones. The article encourages paying a monthly warranty, but holy cow, they are expensive! And the reality is, no insurer wants to fix the old appliance because it costs the insurer more money. They just give you a replacement. And, unfortunately, these warranties only give you the price of the original machine, so you have to pay the current price. (This happened on our dishwasher earlier this year!) So, my question is: Are appliance warranties worth it when know there is a fixed lifespan of these devices?
https://www.everythingbreaks.com/a-closer-look-at-why-modern-appliances-dont-last-as-long/
But you know that’s not the only reason I’m writing about tonight. This idea also relates to the human lifespan.

When we were kids, we had no fear of the universe. We were practically on our own, even if our mothers were home. We had the run of the neighborhood, rode our bikes for miles at a time, and swam in the old swimming hole or pool if we were townies. We didn’t have cellphones or computers, so we didn’t constantly keep in contact with our parents or each other and play games incessantly. We were outside in the world. Who wanted to stay home? We created stories and acted them out on a whim. We read great books out under the trees. We ate apples and peaches off the trees. No one worried about getting hurt, or about stalkers or abductors (although we probably should have way back then). Our mothers fretted only if we hadn’t come home before sundown. We thought that we’d live forever with not a care about the rest of the world.

And then we reached our teen years and everything changed. We worried more about how we looked and what to wear, and what others thought of us. And woe to those (like me) who were the outliers. Our peers created a cast system that didn’t include us. We started wondering why we were put on this earth. We still didn’t believe we were going to cease to exist anytime soon, and felt like our lives were drawn out into a future unknown that we could influence. We’d show those bullies! There was still hope for what was to come. However, there were downsides to our teen years. Women were supposed to get married and men were supposed to work or join the military. Those thoughts were very limiting to our psyches. And woe to those who broke those barriers (and yet today I praise all that did so!)

And then we reached our twenties. We graduated and went off to work or to college, or to war. We still thought we’d live forever, but the weight of the world was starting to fill our heads. We still partied (Party Like It’s 1999 – or Give Me That Old Time Rock and Roll for my generation!) and dreamed. Our bodies were resilient. We knew we would change the world.

And then we got older. We entered into full-blown adulthood: jobs, mortgages, car payments, kids, and the weight of the world became clearer in our thoughts and actions. Although some of our kids were similar to us in that they became the latchkey kids. And yet they didn’t have as much freedom as we did. News made us more fearful as parents, and the children felt it. Phones and computers started taking precedence in our daily lives and we felt like we were in the know. Fear of the future became a little more in our thoughts and our children’s thoughts. We were beginning to feel our age physically and emotionally. We started to think about what would happen to someone if we suddenly weren’t there. Finally, we became more isolated from each other.

And now we are seniors of varying ages, from our 60s to our 80s and older. Sometimes it seems that the weight of the world is upon our shoulders. Lifespan is a thing that we think about every day that we live. We all strive for longevity, but aging is hard. We aren’t able to do all of the things we loved to do in the past due to illness, or just body parts breaking down. And some of us have memory issues so our thought process doesn’t come as fast as they used to when we were in our 20s and 30s. And some of us have given up. Even though our lifespan is longer than our parents, we don’t think we can keep up, mentally and physically, and media sometimes reinforces this negative thought. Health issues have become the forefront of our conversations. We don’t have expectations that we all will live for a century, but we also don’t want to face those conversations. We still want to believe that we are immortal. In 1950, the average life expectancy was 44.5 years for men, and 48.4 for women. In 2024, the average life expectancy is 77 years for men, and 82 for women. So we have made some strides since the 1950s due to the wonders of medicine, eating healthier, and exercising. But, we aren’t carefree and happy.
https://www.worldometers.info/demographics/life-expectancy/
Unfortunately, there are still physiologically upper limits at this point.

In an article from the Harvard School of Public Health, the author stated that “…While the average life expectancy has gone up, maximum lifespan has not changed. Moreover, the pace of increase in average life expectancy has slowed of late….The paper concludes that during that period, medical and public health advances have not slowed human aging and have not done anything to radically prolong lifespan….No strategies have been implemented in that time with that goal in mind….What we have been doing remarkably successfully is reducing deaths earlier in life and allowing more of us than ever before to reach old age.”
For further information, go to the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s article on life expectancy or:https://www.nature.com/articles/s43587-024-00702-3

I believe that scientists will create new studies that look into human expiration dates to determine if it there is some type of genetic coding, or enzymes, or whatever our physical makeup contains, that currently gives us that upper limit. Right now, scientists believe that our bodies have not evolved this longevity capacity so we are limited in time. We are like the appliances that have a life expectancy date due to our manufacturing, And we have no warranties. Can we change this? Something to think about.

And, to further this metaphor of appliance replacement, we replace ourselves generationally with our children and our children’s children (or more recent models) in hopes for a future that is better than before. We strive to make them better than ourselves. We have nurtured them and hope that they have excellent takeaways from our lives. We tell them they are amazing and they can do anything if they put their minds to it. We should also continue to do that to ourselves as we age. Our stress levels should be geared to making a better world for future generations. We have made our mark in the world and hope that they will do the same.

Tonight my plea to everyone is to take advantage of the time we have on earth and become a better person and do great things (or even little wonderful things) for as long as we live! Continue to nurture your relationships. Continue to spread love and guidance to those who are younger than we are. I love you all and hope you think about how to make your own mark in this world!