Recently, I've been thinking about how fast life is changing. My older kids are likely to make it well into that 100- to 150-year-old range, which will soon be the norm. And when I mention that the average female baby born in the U.S. in 2007 will live to see 2107, I have a personal interest because we are expecting another little girl by the end of the year. So, I have to make it into triple digits, too. But the biggest event behind these ruminations was my mother's death a little over a week ago. She went gently at the age of 89, held by my sister, as my brother and I scrambled to get to Des Moines. Like so many of her generation, she spent four years with infants and toddlers while my dad was away at war, and afterwards just kept working that hard her whole life. She earned her retirement.

Yet, she also went too young. Her mother lived to 95 and her slightly younger brother, a Rear Admiral and ex-Commandant of Kings Point, is driving, sailing and leading an active life. But 15 years ago Mom went on Coumadin, which is a killer, and I could not talk her out of it. Aside from giving people Lipitor without telling them that they need to take big doses of CoQ-10 to avoid muscle weakness and death, I think the warfarin rat poison with the sanitized name Coumadin has to be one of the worst things modern medicine does to people. Just check out this article. And that's why I'm also very interested in the better, life-saving medical technologies that are already being developed, or will be, in the upcoming years.

So, In Memoriam, Jane Austin (King) Murphy, March 22, 1918 to September 8, 2007. And don't let any of your loved ones take Coumadin.