Speaking of age, I have been blogging so long that I don't really know what I've posted at this point, and a search only turns up so much. My fear is that I have posted this theory before, as it is one that is central to my half-baked view of the world. If I have, let's just hope I have acquired NEW and USEFUL insight into the human condition (ahem).

OK, so I have this theory that every person has one age that most, well, typifies that person. I don't mean the age at which you "peaked" (with any luck, our lives are not that linear). I mean, some essential part of you was always meant to be, say, 9 or 17, or 43, or 60. It might be something of a maturity thing, but then again it might not. I apologize for the vagueness of all this, but I just mean: it's the age that echoes for you.

I'll start. For me, I believe, it's 10. Something about 10-year-olds strikes such a resounding chord in me that I feel it must have to do with my being essentially 10 inside. And when I write, or at least when I write well, I feel that I am in some way connecting with that true core of myself, and channeling that strange moment when I made sense to myself, the most sense to myself I might ever make.

OK: how crazy do I sound? And what is your true age?