Living forever

I'm a firm believer that everyone needs something that gets them out of the house once in a while. As a fairly recently married man (not quite two years), I have to think that this is the saviour of marriages. There is such a thing as too much togetherness. Just ask my wife. She likes the peace and quiet when I get the hell out. Not that she would put it that way.
For my part, I go for a walk every night. This isn't so much a hobby as for my health. My muscles aren't so good, and my weight is way to much. If I don't exercise now, I won't be able to later. Use 'em or lose 'em. This is guaranteed to give my wife thirty minutes without my constant babbling. If I lose a few pounds as a result, hey, it's a win-win situation!
During the summer, I like to fish. I won't eat anything out of this river, so it's pretty much catch and release. Like I said, it's more a case of having a reason to get out of the apartment for a while. Catching fish isn't the point. It's me time, time to just sit and think. When my friend and I used to go out on the boat, we might not even put the lines in the water.
My dad has his own way of getting out, if not off of the property. As a general rule, he has a pile of dirt. Each year he moves that pile of dirt, or wood (anything will do) from one end of the yard to the other. The next year, he moves it right back to where it was in the first place. This is his choice of how to spend his retirement.
My point is, when we are no longer leaving the house for employment, everyone needs to have something to occupy themselves. The minute you stop moving, you stop living. I know of a few cases where people have retired without considering what they are going to do with the rest of their lives. Some were gone within ten years.
My wife's uncle is a prime example of the need to keep going. He is a cattle farmer, has been his whole adult life. He has a bad back and knee problems. By all common wisdom, he should have given up the hard work years ago. The thing is, he wouldn't know what to do with himself. As long as they can haul his butt into the tractor, or he can ride the utility truck around the fence lines, he is going to farm. When he can't do it at all anymore, I have doubts about how long he'll be with us.
He might surprise us though. My grandparents are long retired. My grandmother has the energy and strength of a woman twenty years her junior. If he hadn't smoked for so long, I think my grandfather (her third husband, by the way) would still be out having fun and making a nuisance of himself. They don't have hobbies per say, they just still have a lot of interest in life.
Maybe that is the key to living a long time. As long as you look forward to each day and it's challenges, you will go on. I've always said that the day there isn't something new for me to learn, I just don't want to keep breathing. Fortunately, I'll run out of life long before the universe runs out of mysteries.