How long?
you asked

Until I cannot remember my name or what I ate for breakfast.
Until the hair on my head has grown gray and thinned with age.
Until I look in the mirror at a face I no longer recognize.
Until my dear friends have passed away and I know soon, I will join them.
Until I’m confined to a home, to a bed I never get up from.
Until a nurse must take care of me and watch my every move,
force-feeding me pills and
applesauce with a plastic spoon.
Until our children bring our uncomfortable looking grandchildren
in to see me, shuffling their feet across the carpeted floor,
unable to make eye contact with me because all I can do
is stare at the moving pictures on the television.

Instead, I half-smiled with a shrug,
and replied,
pretty long.