When I listen to music, like popular music, the music of young people, I start thinking about relationships. It makes me mopey. I'm starting to get old enough that it doesn't seem so crazy to put all of that behind me entirely. It's something I've often both intended and lived. Most of my life has been single, unpartnered. But I go to the gym, or get tired of my book on a walk and play a song, and all the old pain and longing wells up again. And I wonder if this is secretly why old people don't listen to young people's music anymore. It brings up too much. There's too much lost, too much irrecoverable, too much that can't be fixed, too much hopeless. I could still choose to live another way, with another purpose - I think. But eventually you cannot even choose. Eventually it's all gone.