We are writing to inform you that Your Body (“you,” “yourself,” “your aging body”) has updated its terms of service, which apply to the use of all your Parts and Areas.
We encourage you to review the updated Terms before you attempt any dangerous activity, such as playing with your dog or walking uphill. Our other legal policies are available in our Depressing Policy Center.
The Updated Terms
I. Food and Beverage
a. Alcohol No alcohol at all. The best choice ever.
b. Caffeine is one of three good things that exist. The others are love and the Fleetwood Mac album Rumours. However, like the relationship between Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham, your body’s relationship to caffeine is a productive yet fraught dance. If you consume any caffeine after 1 p.m., you won’t get any sleep and will wake up hating the world. Other People’s Bodies can consume caffeine until 3 or 4 p.m. or even have an espresso after dinner. You aren’t them and never will be. Also, if you have more than two (2) cups in a day, you will become convinced that there must be some kind of “demon” inside your chest and you will never be normal again.
c. Despite your many lobbying efforts, chocolate is still not considered their own food group on the pyramid and should not be treated as such.
d. Drinking prodigious amounts of water won’t solve any of your problems, but not drinking prodigious amounts of water can certainly make a few of them worse.
II. Exercise
a. Your Body and Mind require 4–6 days of exercise per week, unless you want to go to sleep hating the world. Unfortunately, every kind of exercise that you enjoy causes Your Body’s back, knees, or ankles to enter “The Zone of Desolation.” Ashtanga Yoga works best for your body.
b. If any physical pain ever starts to feel depressing, it could help to look on the bright side: if you were a hunter-gatherer, you’d probably be dead by now.
III. The Life of the Mind
a. In college, you would read one hundred pages per day and write an essay every week. Now, any paragraph of any news article that “seems long” gets skimmed, and you frequently question the names of your friends’ children. For this reason, you are encouraged to skip all news and reread the entire works of Virginia Woolf and stick with it even if a character is described with avian features, like having a “beak of a nose” or “the broad face and intense glare of an owl,” which you really hate for some reason.
b. Saying Italian place or food names with an Italian accent doesn’t count as “practicing your Italian,” so you are encouraged to stop believing that saying “alooooora” with a long o is doing anything, mentally-wise. Learn another language. French, Japanese, anything that makes you happy.
IV. Which Organs Still Work
a. Your kidneys seem fine.
b. Your pancreas hasn’t set off any alarms (yet).
c. Liver is in very good shape. Thank you for not drinking.
V. Which Organs Are Touch-and-Go
a. Brain.
b. Eyes.
c. Ears.
d. Skin.
e. Lungs.
f. Stomach.
g. All the other ones.
VI. Psychology
a. Abundant studies demonstrate that staying optimistic about the future helps one remain active and engaged in one’s community, family, and personal wellness. If you ever start to believe that life is a one-way escalator moving downward, ever downward, it is recommended that you stop thinking that somehow.
b. It is crucial to cultivate one’s mind-body connection. Reading a study about the benefits of meditation and saying, “I should keep doing that,” is an important first step in realizing that you have no follow-through.
VII. Service
a. As you mature and move forward in life, you ought to give more of yourself to your community. Since you have so much to offer in terms of physical abilities, wisdom, charm, or general usefulness, consider opening a tiny bookstore.
b. You aren’t old enough for people to feel like they should serve you by mowing your lawn or bringing you food that is easy to reheat, but if you keep making intensely mediocre decisions, those days will arrive very soon.
VIII. Benefits
a. Your age has earned you the right to be cranky. You are allowed, whenever you wish, to say things like “All leaf blowers must die” and “As far as I’m concerned, any grocery store that forces you to use self-checkout machines should be considered a terrorist organization.”
b. Once per week, you are allowed to shudder when thinking about what high school would have been like if social media had been around then.
c. If you ever end up having the feeling that you cannot take it anymore, take a deep breath and tell yourself that this too shall pass.
Moving Forward
You need not take any action regarding this alarming notice. By continuing to utilize your Parts and Movements on or after today, you agree to the updated Terms. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact your Prefrontal Cortex or your Limbic System.
