At 91, Still Looking Forward to Tomorrow

This episode reflects on the life and words of Uno Chiyo — a novelist, kimono designer, magazine founder, and businesswoman who lived to 98 and was still talking about wanting to build a building at 95.

A few of her lines are looked at closely here: "I don't have the habit of envying other people" — not a discipline, just an orientation. And her way of approaching even morning miso soup as something to think through in her own particular way, finding room for originality in the most everyday acts.

It touches on a passing thought about studying abroad — originally imagined as something for a daughter, then reconsidered: why does it have to be high school? Why does it have to be someone else?

There's also a thread about strength and self-respect, and a conversation with a second-grade son about how flexibility might be the greatest kind of strength — a thought that Uno Chiyo's words quietly echoed.

A quiet look at what it might mean to age without losing the capacity to look forward — and one particular line that stayed: even at 91, living with the expectation that tomorrow, perhaps, something enjoyable will happen again.