Hindsight often comes a bit late

From MBP [MacBook Pro] dictionary:

Hindsight:  Quote understanding of a situation or event only after it has happened or developed: with hindsight, I should never have gone. Unquote

Eureka: Quote a cry of joy or satisfaction when one finds or discovers something Unquote

Entering my 70s, I find myself constantly having an eureka moment as I go about my daily life, except it’s not of joy or satisfaction, just “oh, I see now what they mean!”.

    I, and the people in my generation that I speak to about such things, remember being told as children by the elders: “You will know what I mean when you get to my age.”  

    It was said so often that one, especially as a child, just treated it as 耳邊風 / 耳边风 ěr biān fēng / “ear side wind” / a puff of wind passing the ear:  unheeded advice, things that these old people kept repeating.

    Before I reached the age of 50, I got up one day to offer my seat to an old lady (in her 60s??) who’d just boarded the bus.  She said, “Thank you kindly, dear, but no, once I sit down, it’s hard to get up again.”  

    My legs haven’t got to that point yet, but I’m surrounded by people whose legs have, and I can see the struggle involved in the simple act of standing up from a seated position, something most people below 60 or 70 take for granted.

    With this in mind, I’m now trying to make up for lost time with regard to doing massage and relieving pain before my hands and fingers lose the strength.  The massage equivalent of 及時行樂 / 及时行乐 / jí shí xíng lè / “reach time carry-out happiness” / enjoying oneself while there’s still time / carpe diem.  

    I’d only started four years back to do massages in earnest, when I was teaching Mandarin and English at a Chinese community centre and found some grateful takers among the ping pong players there, most of whom were retirees (the common generation at community centres and the ones who don’t have to be at work 9–5).  

    I now give massages for free at least three times a week, sometimes more.  The sense of achievement one gets in having people hobble up to you in pain, some nearly half bent over in pain, then standing up straight and stretching out their bodies/arms after 20 minutes of your massage and saying, “Oh, I feel like a new person!” is indescribable and has to be witnessed or experienced in person.

    I wish I’d embarked on it much earlier.  Don’t let it be 耳邊風 to you.  Go out and do whatever it is that gives you a sense of leading a useful life before you lose the opportunity.