Growing old

The continuous flow of life "is, if you like, the unrolling of a spool, for there is no living being who does not feel himself coming little by little to the end of his spool; and living consists in growing old. But it is just as much a continual winding, like that of thread into a larger ball, for our past follows us, becoming larger and larger with the present it picks up on its way; and consciousness means memory."

Henri Bergson, The Creative Mind: An Introduction to Metaphysics, A Citadel Book, Carol Publishing Group, New York 1992, p.164