A quote from my friend Roger
by Josh Staiger
This is from my friend Roger, who lives in California, has two grown sons, and is certainly much wiser than I:
"A former girlfriend became a bit agitated as her thirtieth birthday approached. It wasn't clear whether she was concerned about her biological clock or something else. But, as her significant other at the time, my duty was to calm her and comfort her.
I told her what I had learned by that time: it isn't reaching a particular age (30 instead of 20s, or 40 instead of 30s) which changes your life--instead, your life changes when you leave home, when you leave school, when you marry (or, I suppose, enter a similarly committed relationship), and when you have children.
So, becoming a parent changes most people, and I now can add another life-changing circumstance to that list: when your parents die. Unfortunately, some children are having to deal with that change because of this tragedy. "
-- Roger Wilner (from here)