At 85, with the coronavirus circling, I of course think about my mortality. But it seems to me there is a difference between wanting to live, and the reasons for doing so, and not wanting to die. I don’t want to catch the virus, I don’t want to die period. That is instinctual. If I say to someone ‘I don’t want to die’, it would hardly make sense for them to answer, ‘Why not?’. There are circumstances that might make one want to die – intense and incurable pain for one; but without them, the survival instinct is paramount.

What though are the positive things that make me want to live? I have no children, but I do have nephews through my wife’s family, and we look after them. I look after my wife, as she looks after me. The sense of being valuable to others is key. If I couldn’t be useful to anyone at all my desire to live would be much diminished. But not extinguished. I’d still look forward to enjoying what I enjoy, books, music, movies, pleasures of the table. For a keen chess player as I am, there is always the lure of playing one more good game. And so forth.

All said and done, I want to go on living. But my time will come. I have two sources of comfort about that. One is the famous saying of Epicurus, ‘Where I am, death is not; where death is, I am not.’ That seems to encompass the finality of dying, and its mysterious absence.

And then there is the universe, its unimaginable size and age. The atoms that made up my person and their attendant consciousness will be infinitesimally small specks in the vastness. The ‘I’ that I was will be in good company.

I must admit I don’t think about my mortality a lot even though I am aware that I’m getting older and nearer the end than the beginning of my life. I tend to live in the present or just a little while ahead. I’m almost surprised that I have ‘got away with this’ for so long and know I’ve been lucky.

I do think about deaths and different ones I have known: suicides, unexpected death, and death at a very great age. I feel that the end of life can define the feelings that others have about a life and yet we all have a story in us at any stage of life. I have been lucky to have had a really full life. The most important thing has been family and the joy of watching my children grow up and now parent themselves. I’m proud of how they are all contributing to the world and they are kind and generous. They will be my legacy, as will the relationships I have had in my life. As long as there are enough good people about, things will work out.

There are still so many things to do and I hope I feel like this right to the end. I like to take up as many opportunities as I can as I’ve seen people who didn’t get the chance. I hope I don’t spend too long thinking about my mortality and spend longer thinking about all the things I have heard seen and done. I know this will depend on whether I lose my mental capacity. I’m just going to travel in hope.

Death? I’m terrified by death; my to-do list is too long for death. As a humanist, death is a sign of the finality of my being. The end of me. I struggle with the idea of no more internal dialogue. Nothingness. It seems hardly credible, let alone possible. But it is so. I do occasionally feel jealous of my religious friends, with their presumed self-assurance of immortality in another realm. Humanism brings with it rather a cold, harsh reality of life: the end of me really is the end of me.

But, humanism brings a way to deal with this harshness: make the best of my only life. Okay. I’ve become vegan. I have walked the wards of hospitals as a pastoral supporter. I imbue critical thought in others; how to spot snake oil from palm oil. I’ve started a charity that aims to tackle inequality. I look to treat everyone I meet with respect and warmth. To build bridges and not walls. Especially with people who have very different outlooks on life to myself.

If death comes sooner rather than later, I may not finish my to-dos. But I know I am making the best of the life I have. If I am unable to continue with my projects, maybe others will pick up the batons I leave behind; maybe change for the better will occur after my demise.

Humanist mortality is harsh, but it offers the means by which to make the best of it. I must bring meaning to what I am and what I do. By following humanist principles, I can meet my finality, safe in the knowledge that I did what I could with the time I had and maybe, hopefully, make the world a slightly better place in the process.

I have had, and continue to have, the best of friends. In my younger days I taught P.E. and have enjoyed a physical life.

I love nature and the feel of the wind in my face and blowing through my hair. Storms are my favourite, in particular to be near the sea and see the crashing waves.

I have loved boxing and judo and aikido, and those friends I made have remained true to me. Grateful is a word I would use for my experiences in life.

As I am older now I look back and smile and continue to enjoy each new experience. Savour it all.

No one knows how the end will come and my hope is that I have not offended too many but that I have made many people smile. Being well thought of is important to me.

Some people who I thought highly of have died now and they are missed because I felt they were rich in character.

I have had one or two health scares and I know there is a fragility to life. Tomorrow is not guaranteed. I do not feel afraid as I know that life follows a pattern.

Living on a farm I see life and death on a regular basis.

It would be good to think in some way I have enriched the lives of others and I hope I have been kind to people.

Make the best of every opportunity and keep smiling.

Things begin and things end.

Many will tell you it is not rational to fear death. Why worry about non-existence, they ask. They are right, but I still do. It’s only natural I guess, an innate part of us that some can overcome but many, myself included, can’t. Some suggest we seek solace in the legacy we leave behind us after we’ve gone. Children perhaps, the memories others hold of us, the ripples of the good we have done. Yet I have no children, memories will too die with those who hold them, and ripples fade away to nothing over time. Anyway, even if I could console myself a little in that way, I’m not sure how much effect it would have chasing away the fear of death.

So, what to do? Especially as, entering my 60s, I’m aware that death is no longer the distant prospect it once was. My answer is to remind myself that time spent worrying about it is precious time wasted for no purpose. It will make no difference to the inevitable end of my life, just sap the pleasure I can enjoy in the meanwhile. The one little piece of good I can draw from the occasional pang of fear is to see it as a reminder to make the most of what life is left to me. I would like to think that will be many years, but I need to be conscious that I may not be so fortunate.

I’m lucky that I am retired now and can focus on making the most of the time remaining. I hope that, when the end does come I can look back on my life with some satisfaction, or at least the minimum of regrets.

Ideally, if we live a full life, when the end comes we should be ready to meet it, perhaps even welcome it. Endings of any kind necessarily embody sadness, and in one’s ending of endings the sadness is intensified. Yet endings can also embody satisfactions: in having stayed the course, having achieved things, having put more in than one has taken out.

I have had a disjointed, though colourful, life. I suppose those two are related. There is a danger, particularly in ‘developed’ countries, of seeing success in life as being defined by material accumulation rather than the development of enlightenment, knowledge and wisdom. It is fine to accumulate wealth provided we do so by doing something we love.

Another corrosive issue is safety culture. One aspect of this is keeping life going when there is no life left in life. I intend to plan my exit and be present at my wake, which I hope will be a hell of a party. I found the book ‘Chocolat’ by Joanne Harris an inspiration for this.

My greatest satisfactions are in having effected positive change through doing things which I have taken delight in. I also get a kick out of confounding expectations. I think it is true that as one gets older one regrets more the things one has not done, due to lack of courage, than the mistakes one has made due to poor judgement. Another regret is not appreciating things enough, which I expect is quite common.

A peculiarity of my life is that, after experiencing poor health in childhood, my health has gradually improved as I have aged. This has led to me feeling more light-hearted. Thus, in the autumn of my years, I am enjoying the occasional spurt of late flowering immaturity.