I’ve made peace with being 80. I still don’t know how it happened — so fast — but my focus is becoming clearer. Enjoying nature is the most important thing to me; that’s why I miss the natural beauty of Mt. Desert Island and Tucson so much. Gorgeous gardens and front yards here in the big city must suffice for now.

I need to keep walking, have truth-telling conversations with women friends, gaze at my children’s and grandchildren’s beautiful faces. I must read books and travel more. Write, write, write. That’s it. But how long do I have? No one knows.

Once I knew someone who went on about dying at age 75. That would be enough, I guess. Not for me.

I still think about stuff, like Thomas Friedman’s latest NYT column, “Mamdani Was Wrong to Threaten Netanyahu.” https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/28/opinion/mamdani-netanyahu-stunt-israel.html

Speculation about Mamdani’s threat to arrest Netanyahu in NYC doesn’t concern me. There’s nothing in the current societal realm I’d like to see more than Trump and Netanyahu sharing a prison cell. That’s not going to happen. In my view, it’s disingenuous for Friedman to suggest Mamdani convene a seminar to further a two-state solution in the fraught Middle East. And invite Natalie Portman because she made a good speech?

There won’t be a two-state solution, what with the Oct. 7, 2023 massacre by Hamas of 1,200 Israelis and the Israeli-American genocide (yes, we’re complicit) of more than 73,000 Palestinians in Gaza.

I’m reminded of the very pro-Israeli Jewish man who came into my office at the Arizona Jewish Post in Tucson, where I was the associate editor, around a decade ago.

“When the Arab countries recognize the State of Israel settlements in the West Bank will be dismantled,” he said. https://mei.edu/backgrounder/israeli-settlements-in-the-west-bank/

I flipped out. “That’s insane,” I told him. “Israel will keep building new settlements.” And that’s what happened.

Who has time for such bullshit when you’re 80? I still think about what goes on this world. But I’m doing much better at keeping my eyes on the prize: my last chapter of life.

And I wonder, who was this woman, around thirty years ago, who hiked to the top of Mt. Tamalpais in Berkeley?