Rejuvenation

‘Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety:

Shakespeare wrote about Cleopatra like this. Every woman may dream to have this bliss.

The Tree of Life is the most wanted commodity today. If the ‘Getafix’ magic potion is true and available, it would be the hot thing today. Aging has made people find remedies to stop aging or to reverse the process. This is exploited by people who call themselves magicians or who claim to have connections with the supernatural.

All wish to remain young and enjoy the vigor of youth. For this many spend a lot. Today there are many ‘life’ centers which claim to train one’s mind and body; good food to one’s thoughts and organic food or what they call ‘live’ food to the body; physical exercises and mental exercises meant to help retain the health of a person. If man can have a clone of himself with his youth and vigor preserved, he would certainly spend all he has to have one cloned.

This only brings to mind the quest for some magic potion or ‘water’ which can induce youthfulness and give back the vigor. The myth that the Chinese emperor’s efforts to find the ‘rejuvenating’ pearl made his search party found Japan is also one among them.

The Fountain of Youth in Florida is one created in memory of a person who was supposed to have landed there searching for the ‘Fountain of Youth.’ Nathaniel Hawthorne, in his short story ‘Dr. Heidegger's Experiment’, wrote: Its source is overshadowed by several gigantic magnolias, which, though numberless centuries old, have been kept as fresh as violets by the virtues of this wonderful water. An acquaintance of mine, knowing my curiosity in such matters, has sent me what you see in the vase.

Virgil’s Sibyl asked Apollo only to have as many birthdays as the number of sand grains found on her palm but forgot to ask for youthfulness and its vigor that should go with such a gift and so grew old to live a thousand years.

To live happily one has to realize the meaning of the word rejuvenation; it implies that the person has lost his/her youth and vigor and the longing to get it back and trying to get it back are all the outcome of the loss. On the very day a life is engendered the day of its death is also fixed and growth is only a journey towards that end.

Is it possible to preserve youth and live long, if one can live in a vessel that travels at a speed that is more than the speed of light?