Let’s Get Your Party Started

If Martians were to visit Earth would they be perplexed to find that some folks need a reminder to celebrate each year of their lives? Do you mark your birthdates with cake and a bit of frivolity? Do you spend any quiet time on your birthdays to reflect on the life path you have thus far taken? Do you eagerly anticipate and map out the trajectory of the next year and all the subsequent years of your life?

Would our inter-planetary buddies wonder why many of us think we cease to grow as we exit our teen years or why we dread aging and fear dying? You will likely enjoy this book if you:

• feel a smidgen of unease about aging and dying;


• want to see if worms and chickens can teach life lessons;


• are interested in what fellow life travelers say about growing up, aging, and dying;


• wish to explore cutting-edge research and innovative theories regarding various aspects of our life cycle; and


• want practical, fun ideas to celebrate every age and phase of life to get your party started!

The author considers herself an expert “dier” due to a few near-death episodes, which didn’t involve any cool out-of-body stuff, but did kindle a lot of interesting ideas and questions about why we think what we think regarding each phase of our lives. This sometimes amusing, sometimes quite serious book is not about whether there’s an afterlife; it’s about you in the here and now, filled with many ideas and questions for you to ponder.

In this book, you will be introduced to a variety of perspectives on these and other issues with the intent that by having read it you will live a more examined life. If you are satisfied with your current life path you will get some cool suggestions for more fun. If, on the other hand, you realize that the story of your life could use some editing to address:

• fear – such as fear of public speaking, loneliness, or disasters, or fear of growing up, aging, and dying,


• habits – which you have but would rather avoid, or


• limitations – which keep you from experiencing the fullest, happiest, and most adventurous existence that you can imagine,

then join me for an in-depth (never to be mapped again in all future human history) examination of your amazing life. Let’s get your party started!

Chapter 1 Why Party?

Chapter 2 Let’s Get into the Party Mood

Chapter 3 Reasons for the Party

Chapter 4 Watch Out for the Party Crashers 

Chapter 5 Where’s the Bouncer? 

Chapter 6 So Your Party Hat Keeps Falling Off?

Chapter 7 What if You Were a Honeybee? 

Chapter 8 The Biggest “What Ifs” of All 

Chapter 9 Getting Started—Growing Up 

Chapter 10 Keep Growing—Adulthood 

Chapter 11 Challenges of Aging 

Chapter 12 Perspectives on Dying 

Chapter 13 Rewriting Your Text 

Chapter 14 Let’s Throw a Block Party! 

Chapter 15 Exit Stage Left

Appendices

Appendix 1 Excerpts from the Martian Manual 

Appendix 2 How to Grow a Friendship

Appendix 3 Disaster Preparedness Protocol 

Appendix 4 How to Grow a Group 

Appendix 5 Interviews 

Appendix 6 Additional Party Games

Appendix 7 Supplemental Information—Alzheimer’s

Disease and End-of-Life Planning 

Appendix 8 Message in a Bottle—Suicide

Resources

Definitions 

Quotations 

Topics of Interest

References 

Acknowledgments

About the Author