Cradle to Grave (2017) - full transcript

Through our subject Adam, we reveal the incredible changes and forces that take all humankind from Cradle to Grave.

[heartbeat]

ADAM: Listen.

[heartbeat]

That's the sound of my old heart

beating its four billionth beat.

[heartbeat]

[people chatting]

If you're lucky enough

to reach this milestone,

well, then, I hope, like me,

you'll feel it's worthy

of a toast.

[clinking]

To life.

It's one hell of a ride.

ALL: To life.

ADAM: My name is Adam,

and I'd like to tell you

my story.

Now, are we going to eat

this cake or just look at it?

[laughter]

The whole story

of a single human life...

a transformation

beyond imagination,

inside and out.

How secret worlds you never see

happening inside you

every moment you're alive

drive the person you become

through decades

of choices and chances

that make our lives unique.

So this is my story.

But look a little closer,

and it's your story, too.

The journey of a lifetime

on the path we all travel...

¶ ¶

from cradle to grave.

¶ ¶

RADIO COMMENTATOR: All these

people have come together

to wish joy in the New Year

ahead across this whole land.

Clock is showing there are just

a few seconds to go now

before the New Year, and

the ball has started descending.

ADAM: This is my parents'

apartment

on the night they will always

believe I was conceived.

RADIO COMMENTATOR: 10, 9, 8...

ADAM: But the truth is,

all this moment really gives you

is a ticket to the start line.

[cheering]

¶ [Wagner's

Ride of the Valkyries] ¶

The race for life.

300 million possible people

on an epic journey

across a vast,

hostile territory...

all chasing the same

distant prize--the egg.

A 300 million-to-1 shot,

and just like you,

I beat those odds.

Imagine that.

All the more incredible,

because at this point

'possible me'

was way back in a hundred

and something millionth place.

You see I wasn't the biggest,

the fastest or the strongest.

But you don't have to be.

To win this race...

¶ ¶

you need luck...

you need stamina...

and above all else,

you need...

timing.

BUD ABBOTT ON RADIO:

What did your Uncle Mike do

before he got married?

ADAM: 12 hours later,

and you wouldn't know it

from looking at her,

but a genuine miracle was about

to take place inside my mom.

You see, lucky for me,

my faster brothers and sisters

had been softening up the egg

ahead of me,

so when I finally got there,

I slid right in.

[laughter on radio]

This was the moment

of conception.

ABBOTT: Hey, look, Costello,

it's our secretary,

Viola Vonn.

ADAM: And she never

even flinched.

¶ ¶

I guess my dad would

have been surprised

to know that when

Mom actually got pregnant

he was 12 feet across the room.

Inside the egg, two sets

of chromosomes combine,

23 from each parent--

46 chromosomes containing

the unique DNA code

for who you'll be,

the blueprint for

a brand new human being

inside a single cell.

Now all they had to do was wait.

LOU COSTELLO ON RADIO:

When a 1,000-gallon tank

of hot water was ready,

he'd drag a chicken through it!

[laughter]

ADAM: That cell divided in two,

then four, and kept on going,

till just three weeks later,

my fledgling heart

beat its very first beat.

[rapid heartbeat]

That heartbeat is controlled by

a small patch of nerve cells

called your sinoatrial node,

which raise or lower

your heart rate as required,

and they'll keep doing that job

day in and day out

without you ever having

to think about it,

for the rest of your life.

¶ ¶

[heartbeat]

¶ ¶

Four months and 27 odd million

beats later...

I started to make

my presence felt.

MARIE: Hey, come here.

¶ ¶

Can you feel that?

[muffled music playing]

¶ ¶

BOB: He's dancing.

[muffled music]

ADAM: I may only have been about

11 inches from head to foot,

but inside that head,

my cochlea, the shell-like

part of my inner ear,

was already functioning.

[muffled music]

Sound funnels in, vibrating

thousands of tiny hairs,

each transmitting specific

frequencies to the brain,

letting you respond to music

or your parents' voices,

even if they are a bit muffled.

[muffled]

BOB: Hey in there.

You want to dance with us?

¶ ¶

ADAM: Don't mind if I do.

[muffled music]

¶ ¶

The single biggest development

in the womb, though,

is your brain.

The command center that

controls you is in overdrive,

producing up to 50,000

brand new neurons every second.

By full term, you'll have

100 billion of them

ready to receive and

transmit information.

But this explosive cerebral

growth is also a problem.

After nine months in the womb,

your head has already grown

to a quarter of adult size.

Any bigger, and you'd never

make it out of your mother.

[woman screaming]

So, on September 14, 1950,

for me and my big head...

DOCTOR: It's coming out.

NURSE: Doing good?

DOCTOR: Yep.

ADAM: ...it was now or never.

NURSE: Push.

DOCTOR: Here we go.

NURSE: Good.

[muffled screaming]

You did it.

ADAM: Now, I may have been

out of the womb,

but I wasn't out of the woods.

At birth,

your walnut-sized heart

has already tallied

around 54 million beats.

But for you to survive,

somewhere around beat

54 million and one,

it has to really up its game.

DOCTOR: Here we go. Come on.

ADAM: In the womb,

you got all the oxygen

you needed direct from your mom.

A hole in your heart

bypassed your dormant lungs.

Now that you're out,

your first gasps of air need

to close that hole--and fast.

[smack]

[baby cries]

DOCTOR: There we go.

There we go.

ADAM: Rerouting your blood...

[crying]

and jump-starting your lungs...

DOCTOR: Get this guy covered up

and cleaned up here.

ADAM: ...so that now

blood enters

the right side of your heart,

gets pumped to your lungs

where it takes on oxygen,

then flows back to the left side

where another pump sends it

round your body.

Once that's up and running,

you're on your own.

[crying]

NURSE: Oh!

Would you like to hold him?

MARIE: Yeah.

NURSE: There you go.

MARIE: Well, hi.

¶ ¶

[door opens]

¶ ¶

BOB: Beautiful.

Just like his mama.

NURSE: Does he have a name yet?

MARIE: Adam.

We're gonna call you Adam.

¶ ¶

ADAM: Detroit, 1950.

¶ ¶

The post-war boom

was in full swing.

The American dream was thriving,

and so was I.

A month out of the hospital,

I'd grown an inch

and put on seven ounces.

¶ ¶

Which may not sound like much,

but if you continued growing

at that rate,

by age 10 you'd be

nearly 12 feet tall.

MARIE: He's looking at you.

ADAM: Was I?

Hard to say.

At one month,

you can't focus on anything

more than eight inches away.

But even that blurry image

is something of an achievement.

Your eyes actually work

like pinhole cameras,

meaning the image they see is

upside down and back to front.

Your brain has to learn

to compensate,

inverting the image and

flipping it right-side up.

Focus, movement tracking

and depth perception

take far longer.

¶ ¶

MARIE: What is going on?

What is going on?

ADAM: Six months in, and lucky

for me, my vision was 20/20.

MARIE: Hey.

ADAM: But that didn't mean

I was happy.

[crying]

Because the next major

breakthrough in my development

was beginning to break through.

[crying]

MARIE: Here.

ADAM: Teething.

In the natural growth of your

body, nothing is more violent.

Tooth enamel is the hardest

substance in the human body.

To get a full set of baby teeth,

you have to go through eruptions

like these 20 times.

And it wasn't just

painful for me.

MARIE: Ah! Oh!

ADAM: Honestly, you take

one little nibble,

and it's a one way ticket

to the bottle.

But new teeth meant

new opportunities.

BOB: And here comes

the airplane.

Neeeoowwwmmm!

That's a boy.

That's a boy.

That's my boy.

ADAM: Moving on from milk

brings your digestive system

into its own,

stripping the nutrients that

let you live and grow--

protein, carbohydrates, fats,

vitamins, and minerals--

from every mouthful you eat.

BOB: He's holding

the spoon himself.

[laughs]

ADAM: Astonishingly, to power me

through my life since,

my digestive system

has had to process

more than 70 tons of food.

Back then, all that extra

nutrition let me do something

I'd been itching for--

strike out on my own.

Slow going at first, but

crawling does a lot for you.

Building muscle and developing

balance and coordination,

and giving your rapidly

developing skeleton

a good workout, too.

¶ ¶

Over time, the 300 or so

small bones you're born with

will morph into

206 larger bones.

¶ ¶

From day to day,

the changes you go through

are almost imperceptible,

but speed them up,

and you start to see just

how profound they are.

¶ ¶

In fact, throughout year one,

the only thing constant

in your life is change.

¶ Happy birthday, dear Adam ¶

ADAM: My first birthday.

[clapping]

[clapping]

And also the day that after

a little prompting...

BOB: Watch this.

Say 'Daddy,' Adam.

Daddy.

ADAM: I said my first word.

BOB: Daddy.

Say it for me.

ADAM: Mama.

ALL: Oh!

ADAM: Not quite what

he was gunning for,

but at least he got it on film.

And not long after, with a bit

more help from my pop,

I learned the neatest

trick of all...

opening a world

of possibilities.

¶ ¶

One small step, the first

of around 200 million,

enough to walk right around

the planet four times.

¶ ¶

September 1954,

I was 4 years old,

and about as happy in my world

as a kid can be.

For many in America,

it was a time of innocence.

For others, a time of struggle.

The wheels of change

were turning,

and my life was about

to change dramatically, too.

¶ ¶

MARIE: What?

ADAM: Dad said we were moving...

BOB: We got the loan.

MARIE: You're kidding!

BOB: Uh-uh.

MARIE: Oh, that's wonderful.

ADAM:

...'cause Mom was pregnant.

¶ ¶

ADAM: I wanted no part of it.

So the night before

moving day...

MARIE: Adam?

ADAM: ...I ran away from home.

MARIE: Oh, no.

Bob!

Adam!

[heartbeat]

MARIE: Okay!

BOB: Our new home.

MARIE: Here we are, Adam.

Oh, my!

BOB: Look at this.

MARIE: Oh!

BOB: Picture time.

ADAM: Lucky for me,

my great escape was short-lived.

MARIE: Come on, Adam.

Daddy wants to take a photo.

ADAM: Age four, I wasn't allowed

to cross the street on my own,

so I just walked round and round

the block till they found me.

BOB: Yeah, good spot.

And on three

everybody say cheese!

One, two, three.

MARIE: Cheese!

ADAM: But as I soon found out,

suburban flight had

some major consolations.

¶ I don't even know

the time of day ¶

[yelling]

Like my very own backyard.

I loved it!

Sun on my back,

dirt under my nails,

grass beneath my feet.

¶ ¶

Course I never thought about it

back then,

but all those sensations

are actually down to the largest

and fastest-growing organ

you possess--

your skin.

Super-magnified,

it's a rugged, alien landscape,

not unlike a football with hair.

But take a look under the

surface, and it's so much more.

Your dermis,

a vast, microscopic jungle.

Collagen and elastin give your

skin its stretch and structure.

Sweat glands allow you

to regulate body temperature.

Bundles of nerve cells

let you feel sensations

of touch, heat and pain.

So my first real memory is

how great it felt doing this.

[yells]

MARIE: Adam, bath time.

ADAM: What?

MARIE: Come on, honey,

it's bath time.

¶ ¶

ADAM: It's funny,

the things that stay with you.

I remember Mom saying...

MARIE: Always brush your teeth

twice a day.

It's important.

ADAM: ...although

she never said why.

But when you think right now

there are around 20 billion

bacteria in your mouth

reproducing every five hours,

go 24 hours without brushing,

and that 20 billion

becomes 100 billion.

You can see she had a point.

MARIE: Good boy, Adam.

ADAM: But most of all I remember

that every single day

was an adventure.

¶ ¶

This isn't just

physically exhausting.

Every new experience creates

thousands of extra pathways

between the billions of neurons

in your brain.

It's a total sensory overload,

and that leads

to only one thing.

¶ [Tchaikovsky's Dance

of the Sugar Plum Fairy] ¶

In the first part of sleep,

your exhausted brain

all but shuts down

as your body works on

restoring energy

and repairing damaged tissue.

Then REM, R.E.M. or rapid eye

movement sleep takes over.

Your closed eyes

begin to dart around

as your brain comes alive

and starts to dream.

¶ ¶

And as you dream,

your brain reorganizes itself,

trimming useless connections

and strengthening useful ones,

helping you send information

on your experiences

to the right places.

And the other thing we all do

in our sleep

is most of our growing.

¶ ¶

Three years

of sweet dreams later,

I weighed 59 pounds and was

four feet, two inches tall.

My heart had grown, too,

and in fact, you can tell

how much just by looking at me.

It just so happens that

throughout your life,

your heart is always about the

same size as one of your fists.

[heartbeat]

And that, by the way,

was its half a billionth beat.

¶ ¶

Now, around age seven

your imaginative abilities

begin to explode.

And in 1957, that coincided

with another explosion--

TV Westerns.

I loved them, and

they taught me a lot.

COWBOY: Well, if you're looking

for a fight, young man,

I'd be happy to oblige you.

ADAM: Stand up for what's right,

whatever the cost.

COWBOY: Hey, pilgrim,

you got something on your shoe.

ADAM: And no matter

how hard the fight,

no one ever really gets hurt.

Childish? Without a doubt.

But your sense of

right and wrong at this age

is a key factor in your rapidly

developing personality.

And mine was about to be

tested to the limit...

[bullet ricochets]

¶ ¶

...on my first day at school.

¶ ¶

Now, some moments

change your life

in ways you can't

begin to imagine.

This one changed mine, and it

was all down to Alice Kendall.

ADAM: Hey!

Leave her alone.

As a great man once said,

'If you can keep your head while

all around are losing theirs,

then it's highly likely

you haven't fully grasped

the situation.'

FRANCIS: Oh, yeah?

Who's gonna make me?

ADAM: Luckily, my body

was way ahead of me

and activated

my fight or flight response,

an unconscious evolutionary

reaction to sudden danger,

like a predator,

or in this case, Francis Zito.

Your brain triggers the release

of adrenaline and cortisol.

Your heart beats

faster and harder,

pumping oxygen and glucose

around your body.

Blood vessels in your skin

constrict to limit bleeding

from injury.

Hairs stand on end

as your muscles tense,

ready to defend yourself or run,

and your pupils dilate

as you focus on the threat.

So what was it going to be?

ADAM: If you're looking

for a fight, young man,

I'd be happy to oblige you.

[laughter]

FRANCIS: What did you say,

squirt?

ADAM: I said, hey, pilgrim,

you got something on your shoe.

So it turns out

the top of a person's head

is one of the hardest parts

of the body,

and the 27 bones in your hand,

some of the most delicate.

Ah!

Especially those two.

Ah!

Ah!

[screaming]

Unlike on TV,

someone did get hurt.

GROUP: Fight, fight, fight,

fight, fight, fight!

TEACHER: Francis!

GROUP: Fight, fight,

fight, fight, fight!

ADAM: And along with

a broken hand and a black eye,

I think I might have

been concussed.

'Cause what I heard next was...

ALICE: That was

the sweetest thing I ever saw.

ADAM: Huh?

But apparently...

ALICE: I said that was

the stupidest thing I ever saw.

¶ ¶

ADAM: Ouch.

Ow.

¶ ¶

DOCTOR: Okay, so we're gonna

need to realign the bones

a little bit here.

ADAM: Will it hurt?

DOCTOR: No.

ADAM: Really?

DOCTOR: Nope.

It's gonna hurt like hell.

It's over now.

Let's get you plastered up.

ADAM: Now, all I'd see

in the weeks ahead

would be the plaster cast,

but inside there'd be

a lot going on.

¶ ¶

Blood clots around the break

flooding the area with

an army of repair cells.

Inside the clot,

a loose collagen mesh forms

to bridge the gap.

Cartilage binds

the collagen mesh together,

and that cartilage gets replaced

by newly synthesized bone.

¶ ¶

By the time it's all done,

you'll be good as new.

But in the meantime,

getting plastered up

meant going straight

back to school,

and a whole world of trouble.

[heartbeat]

ADAM: Six painful months as the

school bully's favorite piñata

quickly taught me that flight

is also a useful option.

And that's how I met

Billy and Max.

BILLY: If you hide in here,

you have to bring

cookies and comics.

ADAM: Okay.

BILLY: We'll share ours with you

today 'cause you're new,

but from here on,

you have to bring your own.

ADAM: Turned out I wasn't

Francis's only victim,

and it's funny how a common

enemy brings people together.

Intergalactic Space Baseball.

Whoa.

Okay, so they were geeks

holed up in a janitor's closet,

but then so was I.

And of course, there's nothing

us geeks like more than a plan.

TEACHER: Open it.

FRANCIS:

There's nothing in there.

TEACHER: Open it.

FRANCIS:

No, there's nothing in there.

ADAM: The school pet

went missing.

[squeaking]

FRANCIS: I don't know how

that got in there.

TEACHER: That's it, Francis,

this is the last straw.

Principal's office.

FRANCIS: I didn't do it!

Somebody set me up. It's...

ADAM: Francis got suspended

and his Mom packed him off

to boarding school.

FRANCIS: I didn't do it!

ADAM: I felt pretty bad

about it...

for about five and a half

seconds.

¶ ¶

¶ Tuesday's the day

I'll make you mine ¶

¶ The sun is rising

over the hay ¶

¶ I know it's gonna be

a wonderful day ¶

¶ Good morning, good morning,

rise and shine ¶

Now, somewhere around

the age of eight,

your motor skills

and coordination

begin to rapidly improve,

which comes in handy

when it's all square

at the bottom of the ninth

in a serious game

of intergalactic baseball.

BILLY: On this pitch rests

the future of the galaxy.

ADAM: And when you think about

what's involved

in actually hitting a baseball,

it's a wonder they ever get hit.

First, your eyes have

to detect the ball...

then your brain needs to

calculate the speed and path...

before sending signals

to your larger muscles

to move your body into the right

position to begin your swing...

and you adjust your hands

and the path of the bat

to meet the ball.

Even as kids, we're capable

of doing all these things

in less than

a quarter of a second.

¶ I know it's gonna be

a wonderful day ¶

¶ Good morning, good morning ¶

BILLY: The aliens win!

The aliens win!

¶ Good morning, good morning,

rise and shine ¶

ADAM: Beat 581,042,006.

My first home run.

¶ ¶

Over the next three years

I grew seven inches taller

and gained 18 pounds.

And I actually started

to like school.

TEACHER: Getting there, Adam.

Keep it up.

ADAM: Around age 12,

you start thinking in more

complex and abstract ways,

and that's when

I heard something

that stopped me in my tracks.

TEACHER: Now, I promised you

a treat, and here it is.

We're going to listen

to our president.

[click]

JOHN F. KENNEDY:

We choose to go to the moon...

ADAM: It was like he was

talking right to me.

KENNEDY: We choose to go

to the moon in this decade

and do the other things...

not because they are easy,

but because they are hard.

BILLY: Watch out, the asteroid!

KENNEDY: Because that goal will

serve to organize and measure

the best of our energies

and skills.

¶ ¶

ADAM: If JFK was going

to the moon,

every kid in America

was going with him.

But as it turned out, of course,

even those with the greatest

vision can't see the future.

MAN ON RADIO:

They found several witnesses

who saw a man in the window

of a building

overlooking the parade route

with a gun in his hand.

MAN: ...by the White House

press secretary

that President Kennedy died

at approximately one o'clock

Central Standard Time,

which is about 35...

ADAM: The shock of that moment

shook America to its core.

I've heard people say their

childhood ended that day.

And not long after,

mine actually did.

¶ ¶

It all started when

my hypothalamus

sent a signal

to my pituitary gland

telling it to release a couple

of gonadotropic hormones,

which stimulated

testicular growth,

flooding my system with

20 times more testosterone.

And that starts

a chain of events

which transforms you completely.

¶ ¶

Puberty.

[heartbeat]

ADAM: Now, at the time

it all seems very serious,

but looking back, puberty has

a hell of a sense of humor.

The first thing you notice is

you have hair in new places,

around your groin and

under your armpits.

The next thing you notice

is the smell.

Now, we may think of BO

as a bad thing,

but it's part of the whole point

of this new growth.

Pubic hair not only acts as a

visual signal to potential mates

of the changes

you're going through,

but by increasing

the surface area

that your natural scent

can cling to,

it also signals those changes

by smell...

whether you like it or not.

[aerosol spray hissing]

For puberty's next trick,

your whole body goes through

a growth spurt.

But the awkward thing is,

not all at once.

Your extremities begin

to grow first--

hands, feet and head,

followed by your legs and arms,

and then finally, mercifully,

your torso and

your shoulders catch up.

In three years,

I'd grown ten inches

and reached full

sexual maturity.

Okay.

TEACHER: It is possible to live

on nothing but furious hope,

Robert.

ADAM: Puberty's final trick

is a doozy.

TEACHER:

...and this system was...

ADAM: Just as it gets you

interested in girls,

and when I say girls, I should

really say Marianne Hapinowicz,

it does this to your face.

¶ I found love ¶

Glands in your skin produce

an oily substance called sebum

to help moisturize

and protect it.

The extra testosterone

puberty loads into your system

slams sebum production

into overdrive.

Dead skin cells, dirt

and bacteria get trapped

causing inflammation

and infection.

Pus forms in your sebum glands

and oozes up to the surface.

¶ Bring me joy,

my sweet lover boy ¶

In just one year the average

teenager produces enough sebum

on their forehead alone

to fill a coffee cup.

TEACHER: And that answer

would be?

Marianne.

MARIANNE: The third party suits.

TEACHER: Correct.

ADAM: Still, I wasn't alone.

TEACHER: The mineworkers become

soldiers, singing while they...

ADAM: Needless to say, none

of us had dates for junior prom.

¶ ¶

A year later, though,

it was the summer of love,

and things were on the up.

My skin had cleared up,

and I was tall enough

to make point guard

on the varsity basketball team.

BILLY: Hi.

GIRLS: Hi.

ADAM: Then one night

after a win...

MARIANNE: Hey, Adam.

Can I talk to you?

ADAM: Sure.

MARIANNE: Alone?

ADAM: Yeah. Yeah.

Uh, yeah.

¶ ¶

It turns out that looking

at back at your first love

and wondering 'What the hell

was I thinking?'

has a scientific explanation.

Evolution is pro-reproduction,

so it doesn't want

a little thing

like being infatuated

with someone

who's actually only interested

in your jacket

to get in the way.

MARIANNE:

Okay, well, this is me.

ADAM: Yeah.

MARIANNE: You can kiss me

if you want.

¶ I'll be yours forever ¶

Wait.

¶ Forever and a day ¶

¶ And I know... ¶

ADAM: In the early days

of a relationship,

your brain actively switches off

what little critical faculty

it has...

MARIANNE: Bye, Adam.

ADAM: ...so that you don't

notice things

you don't like

about your partner.

Love really is blind.

¶ ¶

¶ ¶

Now, the way I remember it,

I'd never been happier.

But strangely enough, the level

of serotonin in your brain,

which you have to thank

for your sense of happiness

and well-being,

actually falls

when you fall in love.

But at the same time,

dopamine levels increase,

causing feelings of pleasure,

euphoria and excitement,

which feels great,

so you seek more,

which releases more dopamine,

which feels great,

so you seek more, and so on.

In fact, chemically speaking,

love has more in common with OCD

and drug addiction

than with actual happiness.

Nonetheless,

I can think of worse ways

to have clocked up

my first billionth beat.

Spring 1968, a few months

before graduation.

My grades were good,

Marianne and me were

nuts about each other,

and the team was great, two wins

away from qualifying for state.

This is my anterior cruciate

ligament,

the part of my knee

that connects my thighbone

to my shinbone.

[crunch]

Ah! Argh!

And then it didn't.

Ligaments are there to limit

the movement of your joints,

stopping them moving

the wrong way.

Ah! Mmm. I'm okay.

Without that limitation...

Ah! Ahh!

[buzzer sounds]

...my season was over.

But at least I still had

Marianne to cheer me up.

[doorbell rings]

Hi.

MARIANNE: Adam.

Look, there's no easy way

of saying this,

but there's someone else.

ADAM: What?

MARIANNE: It just happened.

We love each other.

I'm sorry,

it's really hard for me.

[heartbeat]

ADAM: Beat 1,015,000,072.

My first broken heart.

[heartbeat]

[crickets chirping]

Perfect.

[thunder]

¶ ¶

¶ I shouldn't have called you ¶

Getting dumped hurts at any age,

but the first time

hurts like hell,

and part of that is because

of a major imbalance

in your teenage brain.

Your limbic system is

pretty much fully grown,

so you feel strong

adult emotions

like love, desire, and

deep, bitter, burning rejection.

But your prefrontal cortex

that lets you put things

in perspective

and stops you doing rash things

still has years of growing

left to do.

[girls screaming]

It's the reason Romeo and Juliet

didn't end too well.

And it's probably also the

reason why in January 1969...

SERGEANT: Rodriguez.

ADAM: I enlisted in the Marines.

SERGEANT: Hartson!

ADAM: Sir.

ADAM: Knew I'd be going

to Vietnam,

but as I reported for nine weeks

of basic training,

honestly, I was excited.

SERGEANT: Seymour.

ADAM: New place, new experience,

new people.

SERGEANT:

I don't have a form for you.

What's your name, son?

FRANCIS: Sir, Francis Zito, sir.

Hey, squirt.

¶ ¶

SERGEANT: Eyes front!

ADAM: You have got to be

kidding me.

SERGEANT: Grab your gear,

get in that building.

Now, now, now!

Let's move it, let's move it,

let's move it, let's move it!

Too slow, too slow.

Let's go, go, go, go, go!

[heartbeat]

ADAM: January 1969,

Marine Corps training.

And if I was worried

about Francis Zito,

I was about to discover

I had bigger problems.

SERGEANT: Rise and shine!

Right, let's go!

Let's go, boys, let's go!

Put on your...

ADAM: You learn a lot

in basic training.

And you learn it...

SERGEANT:

Put your boots on, guys.

ADAM: ...on the run.

SERGEANT:

Put your boots on.

Run, run, run!

Let's move it, let's move it.

Go, go, go, go, go,

go, go, go, go!

ADAM: Now, I wasn't the biggest,

the fastest or the strongest,

but you don't have to be.

Oxygen and glucose

are what your muscles need

to keep them going.

SERGEANT: Let's go. Move it,

move it! Move it, move it!

ADAM: You breathe harder to get

more oxygen into your blood.

Your heart beats faster to get

that oxygen to your muscles,

where it gets burned with

glucose to create energy.

It's called aerobic respiration.

Age 18, your maximum heart rate

is just over

200 beats per minute,

so all 12 pints of your blood

can be pumped round your body

in around 18 seconds.

But after a while,

that's still not enough.

To keep you going,

your muscles switch to burning

glucose without oxygen,

anaerobically,

which is fine for a while,

but anaerobic respiration

creates a byproduct

called lactic acid...

SERGEANT: Let's go,

let's go, let's go.

ADAM: ...which causes

that burning feeling

as your muscle fibers begin

to be ripped apart.

SERGEANT: Keep going.

You will not give up!

ADAM: Which sounds bad...

SERGEANT: You understand?

ADAM:

...but add a bit of this...

SERGEANT: Chow down!

ADAM: ...and that's actually

how you get stronger.

Protein repairs

your damaged muscles,

building bigger

and thicker fibers.

Carbs replace

the glucose you've lost,

allowing you to go out the next

day and do it all over again.

SERGEANT:

Let's go, let's go.

Too slow!

Let's see you run.

ADAM: Pretty soon I was

in the best shape of my life.

SERGEANT: Let's go,

let's go, maggots.

ADAM: So what to do with

physical perfection at age 18?

SERGEANT:

That's it, let's go.

ADAM: Take it for granted,

of course.

GROUP: Oh!

[yelling]

ADAM: Alcohol absorption

is immediate,

and your liver can only process

about one drink per hour.

ALL: Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!

ADAM: Any more than that

and the alcohol goes directly

to your brain,

which can lead to slurred

speech, blurred vision...

Next time! Next time!

...and various types

of poor judgment.

[shouting]

When you're facing

imminent jungle warfare,

smoking doesn't seem

that serious.

But, of course, it is.

[shouting]

Cigarette smoke contains

something like 4,000

harmful chemicals

that paralyze the tiny hairs

that clean out your lungs.

Mucus and toxins build up,

your lungs get congested,

and the harmful chemicals

pour into your bloodstream.

Do this for long enough,

and one way or another,

there's a good chance

it'll be the end of you.

[shouting]

SERGEANT: What the hell

are you guys doing?!

ADAM: Maybe it was just because

we were a long way from home...

SERGEANT:

...seven, eight, come on...

ADAM: But Francis Zito,

my grade school nemesis,

actually became my friend.

SERGEANT: ...eight, nine.

ADAM: I forgave him for making

a year of my life a misery,

and he forgave me for putting

the school pet in his locker.

FRANCIS: You sneaky

son of a bitch. I...

SERGEANT: No more talking,

you maggots, you keep cutting!

Let's go.

ADAM: I wasn't exactly my

drill sergeant's favorite cadet.

SERGEANT: Is that

as straight as you can stand?

ADAM: Sir, yes, sir!

SERGEANT:

I can't hear you.

ADAM: Sir, yes, sir!

ADAM: But with one week

till graduation,

I was a lean, mean

fighting machine.

[gunshots]

Then...

SERGEANT: Rise and shine, boys,

rise and shine.

ADAM: Out of nowhere...

SERGEANT: Faster! Let's go, men.

Come on, guys.

ADAM: I don't feel so good.

SERGEANT:

Stand up straight.

What's wrong with you?

¶ The party's over now ¶

ADAM: Measles.

Never had them as a kid,

and I guess a few other guys

in my bunkhouse didn't either.

The measles virus

gets into your system

through close contact with

someone who already has it.

Once there, it shoves its way

inside your cells,

hijacking them and forcing them

to produce copies of itself

at a blistering rate.

That's what's going on

inside you

when you get a virus, any virus.

You're being hijacked

from the inside out.

T-cells are your body's

special forces,

sent in to figure out how

to attack the hijacked cells

and kill the virus inside;

and when they do,

they remember how they did it

for the next time.

So over a lifetime we develop

a whole army of memory T-cells

each designed to combat

a specific viral threat...

[coughing]

...in theory.

Now, maybe it was the smoking

or maybe just bad luck,

but the virus took hold

in my lungs,

developing into

full-blown bronchopneumonia.

From peak physical condition, I

was reduced to a total invalid.

Coughed so much I thought

I was going to die.

And I guess

the Marine Corps did, too,

'cause when the rest of

my platoon departed for Vietnam,

I got handed a general discharge

on medical grounds.

NEIL ARMSTRONG:

That's one small step for man,

one giant leap for mankind.

[coughing]

ADAM: Man had made it

to the moon,

and before the end of the

decade, just like JFK promised.

I hadn't even made it

out of my bedroom.

[coughing]

¶ ¶

Turned out Francis Zito

was killed

just five weeks

into his tour of Vietnam.

[explosion]

Couldn't make sense of it.

Still can't, if I'm honest.

One twist of biological fate,

and he could have been

coughing his lungs up

watching Neil Armstrong

while I was catching a bullet

in the jungle.

I'd been given a second chance.

I just had to figure out

what to do with it.

¶ ¶

As the '70s began,

America was polarizing,

and it seemed like everyone

was choosing sides.

RICHARD NIXON:

People have got to know

whether or not

their president's a crook.

Well, I'm not a crook.

ADAM: I wanted no part of it.

But all of a sudden,

I wasn't a kid anymore,

and the choices and chances

that would determine my life

were about to play out.

¶ ¶

¶ Caught between

now and a dream ¶

Looking back,

it all seems so inevitable.

But what if I hadn't wound up

in New York in 1975?

What if I hadn't been working

in that bar that night?

And what if she

hadn't walked in?

[heartbeat]

¶ ¶

[ding]

ADAM: Beat 1,281,000,042.

When everything changed.

ALICE: Hi.

Can I get two rum and Cokes

and vodka tonic, please?

ADAM: Yeah, sure thing.

I'll bring them over to you.

ALICE: Thanks.

You've got something

on your shoe...

pilgrim.

ADAM: Hey, pilgrim,

you got something on your shoe.

[yelling]

ADAM: Alice?

[laughs]

ALICE: Hi, Adam.

I thought that was you.

ADAM: Whoa.

Alice Kendall.

ALICE: Mm-hmm.

That was the stupidest thing

I ever saw.

ADAM: What are you doing

these days?

Do you live around here

or are you married or...?

ALICE: Uh, yeah.

Yeah, I live around here,

but, no, I'm not married.

And by the way...

it was the sweetest thing

I ever saw.

¶ ¶

¶ What is this? ¶

ADAM: Now, science will tell you

that there was a lot more

going on in that moment

than I realized.

¶ ¶

It will tell you that the beat

I felt my heart skip

was actually

a surge of adrenaline

acting on the sinoatrial node

that controls it.

¶ ¶

Science will go on to say that

I had subconsciously assessed

that Alice's full lips,

glossy hair,

and low waist-to-hip ratio

meant she was healthy, fertile,

and had a high probability

of future reproductive fitness.

¶ ¶

Well, science can take a walk

on this one.

What I'll tell you is

the smartest, funniest,

and most beautiful human being

I had ever met

was smiling at me,

and I never wanted her to stop.

I knew I needed to get serious,

so I quit the bar and

got my first real job--

apprentice welder fixing

subway trains for the city.

[tools whirring]

God, it was loud.

My ears would be ringing

for hours.

I didn't know it at the time,

but that ringing is

a cause for alarm.

Inside your cochlea, the tiny

hair cells that amplify sound

and send individual frequencies

to your brain

can be damaged by loud noises.

Once they're broken,

you'll never hear a peep

out of those hairs again.

But all I cared about

was getting home to Alice.

Now, this wasn't just fun.

There are actual

health benefits.

Hormones released during sex

reduce stress,

lower blood pressure

and boost immunity.

ADAM: Oh!

ALICE: Oh!

ADAM: Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh!

There's even a hormone that

raises your pain threshold.

¶ ¶

[sighs]

After orgasm,

other hormones are released

which make you feel

super relaxed

and also stimulate

your appetite,

so some people feel like this...

ALICE: Do you want to get

Chinese food?

ADAM: And other people...

¶ ¶

Hey, give me a break.

ALICE: Hmm.

MINISTER: Do you, Alice,

take Adam...

ADAM: In 1979,

I raised my life expectancy

by approximately 2.5 years,

or as it's otherwise known...

MINISTER: ...do you part?

ALICE: I do.

ADAM: ...got married to

the girl of my dreams.

You might think, then,

that the minister saying...

MINISTER: I now pronounce you

man and wife.

You may kiss the bride.

ADAM: ...would have been

the most unforgettable thing

anyone said that day.

But like always,

Alice topped it.

ALICE: And by the way,

you're gonna be a dad.

ADAM: What?!

ALICE: Mm-hmm.

¶ ¶

ADAM: I got to tell you,

I was shocked.

And I didn't know

the half of it.

¶ ¶

Sometimes the race for life

has two winners,

and we called ours Amy...

and Francis.

[baby sneezes]

ALICE: Oh, bless you.

[sneezes]

ADAM: Holding the twins,

I never felt anything like it.

Alice and me had fulfilled

our biological purpose.

The coded message in our DNA

handed down through countless

generations had been passed on.

All we had to do was

look after them

until they were ready to pass

that message on again.

[cries]

And that's the hard part.

Bigger family meant

a bigger house and bigger debt,

which meant more hours

and less sleep.

To top it all off,

I enrolled in night school

on a degree program.

RONALD REAGAN: I, Ronald Reagan,

do solemnly swear

that I will faithfully execute

the office of President

of the United States.

ADAM: If a TV cowboy

could be president,

I figured the sky was the limit.

Kids, work, study, bills.

I swear, from that moment on,

it seemed like someone

pressed fast forward.

[rockets roaring]

¶ ¶

As you move through

your 30s, though,

cellular replication

and repair are slowing.

¶ ¶

So some parts of you,

like your eyes, for example,

begin to show their age.

But of course, where vision is

concerned, there's an easy fix.

Ah.

ALICE: They look good.

ADAM: For all of three seconds

it was great to see

clearly again.

Beat 1,800,046,012.

My first gray hair.

Hair color is determined

by the amount of melanin

injected into your follicles.

As you get older,

you produce less melanin,

and individual follicles

stop injecting it

in the hairs they produce.

Given your scalp has between

100,000 and 150,000 hairs

at any one time,

a few gray ones shouldn't

cause too much upset.

And at first, of course, there's

an easy fix for them, too.

¶ ¶

REPORTER: The Berlin Wall

on the west side

of the Brandenburg Gate,

I'm John Miller.

ADAM: In 1989 I finally got

my evenings back,

graduating night school

with a bachelor's degree

in structural engineering.

REPORTER: The wall is being

physically torn down.

Both German citizens

and soldiers

are taking their hammers

and chisels to the wall...

[phone rings]

ALICE: You know,

now that you're certified,

maybe they'll let you

put it back up.

REPORTER: ...you're witnessing

tonight a moment in history

is what you're seeing

and hearing

is thousands of Berliners,

East and West, dancing...

ADAM: Hello?

Hey, Mom.

Are you watching this?

REPORTER:

...as they come together

to celebrate the end here.

ADAM: What is it?

What?

Oh, no.

That call was the start

of the worst year of my life.

[heartbeat]

[bells tolling]

ADAM: November 1989,

my father died.

You know deep down it's going to

happen someday, you know it,

but then it happens,

and nothing can prepare you

for the shock of it.

MINISTER: And in closing,

Adam and Alice wanted me

to let you all know

that after the burial service...

ADAM: A year later, it was Mom.

MINISTER: And of course,

you're all more than welcome

to join us.

ADAM: They said it was

heart failure,

but honestly, I think she died

of a broken heart.

Sudden bereavement raises

cortisol levels in the body

for an average of six months

after the event.

If you're not in the best

of health, like Mom wasn't,

then the effect

can be devastating.

ALICE: You okay?

ADAM: I just keep thinking about

all the things that

they gave me.

I...

I thought I could

pay them back one day.

ALICE: You know, I don't know if

you're supposed to pay it back.

I think you pay it forward.

And I think they knew that.

¶ ¶

ADAM: So, a year on,

this was me paying it forward.

And for a guy of 40,

I felt pretty good.

Still run rings around the kids

in the front yard.

AMY: Yeah!

ADAM: No!

[cheering]

ADAM: That's it.

Yeah, well, Amy is a cheat.

Don't let anybody tell you

otherwise.

[shouting]

High fives for everybody!

[children yelling]

The 1990s had begun, and

the old certainties were gone.

America was facing new

challenges and new threats...

and so was I.

¶ I want to drive you

till sunrise ¶

¶ And drive you

into the moonlight ¶

On the surface,

things were good.

Instead of fixing subway trains,

I was riding them to my new job.

¶ ¶

But inside, my body was

beginning to travel

in the wrong direction.

In a single day,

to keep you going,

the gallon and a half of blood

in your veins

has to travel

an astonishing 12,000 miles--

four times the distance

across the United States

from coast to coast.

Smooth, flexible arteries

are a key part of that,

but from around age 20,

they get progressively stiffer.

It's nothing to worry about

on its own.

It's only a problem

if we do other things

to make that journey

more difficult.

¶ ¶

And, of course, I was too busy

to think about it...

so I did.

Bad diet can become

a vicious circle.

Fatty foods and sugar are

instant sources of energy,

so you're programmed

to like them.

The taste activates

your brain's reward system,

the same dopamine pathways

as drugs, alcohol

or teenage infatuation,

which make you seek out more,

like an addiction.

Yeah, no, that would work.

Correction, it is an addiction.

¶ ¶

So you get fatter, and not just

where you can see it.

Visceral fat builds up

around your heart,

and bad cholesterol begins

to stick to the interior

of your already hardening

arteries,

making them narrower as well.

It's called atherosclerosis,

and it's a problem.

It means the blood's journey

around the body

gets a little more pressured.

[bell ringing]

Sugar also causes

a chemical reaction

that begins to break down

the collagen and elastin

that give your skin

its stretch and structure.

You get crow's feet, and your

worry lines become permanent.

Over time, all those things

together have quite an effect.

¶ ¶

Before I knew it,

my two billionth heartbeat

was long gone,

and the 20th century

was history.

CROWD:

Five, four, three, two, one.

[cheering]

ADAM: I was 50 years old,

and I'd been pushing my body too

hard and too far for too long.

It all came to a head

on my first vacation in years.

This was a good idea.

ALICE: Mmm.

ADAM: Thanks.

ADAM: Three days

before my 51st birthday.

How long do you need?

ALICE: About ten minutes.

ADAM: Okay.

I guess I don't have

to tell you the date.

BROADCASTER: ...live continuous

coverage of a plane crash

into the World Trade Center

this morning...

ADAM: Oh, my God.

Alice, take a look at this.

[overlapping reporter

conversations]

ALICE: Oh, my God, that's

12 blocks away from Amy's work.

REPORTER: ...to determine

exactly the cause...

ALICE: Oh! Oh.

REPORTER: Alright, Karl.

REPORTER: That was

a second plane that just...

ADAM: Okay, you call Amy,

I'll call the boys.

[overlapping reporter

conversations]

Hormones released

in response to shock

can lead to pieces of plaque

built up by atherosclerosis

rupturing,

causing a wound

in your arterial wall.

Blood quickly clots

at the site of the rupture.

If this happens to you,

the first thing

you're likely to notice

is a dull pain in your back...

ALICE: ...call in.

Hello? Hello?

ADAM: ...which spreads

to your jaw,

then a tingling sensation

in your left hand.

As it turned out, the clot was

in my left main coronary artery,

and it stopped my blood

in its tracks.

ALICE: Adam!

ADAM: Oh!

ALICE: Adam!

ADAM: This condition

has a nickname.

ALICE: Breathe.

I'm gonna get you help.

[gasping]

I'm gonna get you help.

[gasping]

ADAM: They call it

a widow-maker.

ADAM: So that's how I died,

at the age of 50.

Wait, that can't be right.

Ah, that's it.

That was how I died,

and this was how they brought me

back to life.

[monitor beeping]

You see, lucky for me, there was

a doctor staying at the hotel.

DOCTOR: Adam, can you hear me?

ADAM: He performed CPR

for nearly half an hour

until the ambulance

finally got there.

DOCTOR: Adam, can you hear me?

ADAM: Your chance of survival

falls 10%

with every minute

that you don't get CPR

after sudden cardiac arrest.

So I quite literally

owe him my life.

[monitor beeping]

And this man with his hands

in my chest

is the other man

I owe my life to.

DOCTOR: Bit more.

ADAM: Later on, he was

kind enough to fill me in

on what he did to me.

DOCTOR: First off, we put

a stent into your artery,

a mesh tube to keep

the artery open.

¶ ¶

Then we repaired the damage

to your mitral valve

caused by the heart attack...

¶ ¶

and then we restarted

your heart.

Clear.

[zap]

[monitor beeping]

[breathing]

ADAM: The amazing thing was,

even after all that trauma,

in that instant my heart

went right back to doing

what it always had done--

pumping my blood

and keeping me alive.

¶ ¶

The rest of me

took a while longer.

Where...?

ALICE: The hospital.

You've had an operation,

but you're okay.

¶ ¶

ADAM: Oh, God.

I'm so sorry.

ALICE: Oh...

Don't.

ADAM: Having a major

heart attack hurts.

Realizing it's all

your own fault hurts worse.

Apparently, heart disease

strikes someone in the US

about once every 43 seconds,

and every year

around 735,000 Americans

will have a heart attack.

More than 90% of those

are preventable.

Six weeks later,

we got back to New York.

The hole in the skyline

was truly a shock.

[siren]

I read later that

the psychological stress

surrounding 9/11 triggered up to

a third more cardiac events

in some places in the months

following the attacks.

So as America came to terms

with ground zero,

I came to terms

with a new reality, too.

[chuckles]

ALICE: Do you think you could

walk from here to the mall

in under five minutes?

ADAM: Why?

ALICE: It says here,

'The amount of energy required

to perform intercourse with

a spouse or regular partner

is similar to walking about

one half mile at a brisk pace.'

[laughs]

ADAM: Oh! Ow!

Stop. Don't make me laugh.

ALICE: I'm just saying

keep me posted is all.

[laughs]

ADAM: Ow! Stop, stop, stop.

When you're looking

to change your life,

I guess there's nothing like

having an incentive.

So when the rest of me

finally healed up,

I set out to do

something about it.

¶ Take what I want,

want what I take ¶

Three miles a day!

Half an hour out of my schedule,

and I felt better every time.

¶ ¶

And I wasn't just running off

the spare tire around my middle.

Every single stride

was also running off

the visceral fat

surrounding my heart.

BARACK OBAMA: Yes we can.

[cheering]

Yes we can.

[cheering]

Yes we can.

¶ Take me away, take me away ¶

ADAM: Before my heart attack,

I was always running

to stand still,

never had time for anything.

Now work took a back seat and

I actually got to enjoy things.

OBAMA: Yes we can.

ALICE: This here, that's it.

ADAM: Alice and me

took up dancing.

ALICE: Okay? One, two, three...

ADAM: And it didn't matter

that we were horrible at it.

No, you screwed up.

ALICE: No, that was wrong.

ADAM: You're supposed

to be the expert.

The point is we were dancing.

ALICE: Cha-cha-cha,

one, two, good.

ADAM: Okay.

ALICE: Oh!

ADAM: Oh!

[laughing]

¶ ¶

DOCTOR: Just breathe normally.

ADAM: None of us can

turn back the clock.

DOCTOR: Good, good. And

in and out through your mouth.

ADAM: But in biological terms,

we can sure slow it down

a little.

DOCTOR: Good, and again.

ADAM: When I was 51, my doctor

had calculated my biological age

as nearly 60.

At 66, it was...

DOCTOR: 62.

That's quite the turnaround.

ADAM: 62?!

DOCTOR: You can button up.

Congratulations

on the retirement, by the way.

ADAM: Thank you.

DOCTOR: So what's next?

ADAM: It was a good question.

Thanks to my fitness drive

and continuing advances

in medical science,

as my three billionth beat

ticked over,

there was still

plenty of life to come.

OBAMA: I believe we can send

humans to orbit Mars

and return them safely to Earth.

[cheering]

ADAM: And there was no denying

we were headed

for uncharted territory.

So what was next?

Ah, I don't know.

I guess I'll find out.

[heartbeat]

¶ ¶

ADAM: No more work meant

no need to live in the city,

so we bought the holiday cottage

we used to rent.

Oh, I just thought of something.

ALICE: What?

ADAM: It's an awfully long walk

to the mall from here.

[giggles]

ALICE: What, right now?

ADAM: Yeah, let's go in.

Let's try it out.

ALICE: I have a better idea.

ADAM: What, out here?

ALICE: Yes.

ADAM: Come on.

Just because

you're a senior citizen

doesn't mean you can't still

rise to the occasional occasion.

[lawnmower]

In fact, studies show

that people over 70

are more content than

at any other time of life.

ALICE: Oh, it was so much fun.

Off you get.

ADAM: And there's no

greater pleasure

than seeing the children

you raised

raise children of their own.

ALICE: Aww.

That was great.

ADAM: Especially when

they take them home again.

ALICE: Bye-bye!

ADAM: Bye, kids.

ALICE: See you!

¶ ¶

ADAM: Hey, hear that?

ALICE: Yeah. Our song.

ADAM: Our song.

Aww, let's do a little dance.

ALICE: Aww.

¶ ¶

ADAM: Ah, where did

the last 50 years go?

ALICE: Well, I guess time flies

when you're having fun.

[laughs]

ADAM: Come on, let's go inside.

ALICE: Yeah.

ADAM: No one can win

the war against aging,

but you don't have to go down

without a fight.

Cycling was my weapon of choice.

Woo-hoo!

ALICE: Do you really

need the helmet?

ADAM: Come on.

It's sexy!

ALICE: Oh, you old thing.

ADAM: Other things, though,

you just have to accept.

The collagen and elastin

that gave my skin its stretch

and structure

are all bent out of shape,

so my skin has been collapsing

like a facial Grand Canyon.

Looking in the mirror,

I hardly recognize the person

looking back.

And sometimes what I see

scares me.

ALICE: You really should get

that mole looked at.

ADAM: Yeah, I think I will.

¶ ¶

DOCTOR: It's cancer.

ADAM: Oh.

Melanoma, to be precise.

Apparently, the damage

had been done years before--

UV light from the sun

or from welding,

or from who knows where?

A moment 50, 60, 70 years before

caused a mutation

that had been slowly replicating

ever since.

DOCTOR: But I'm pretty sure

we caught it in time.

ADAM: I see.

Sure, things go wrong,

but modern medicine

has a lot of answers.

They cut that melanoma out

and another two as well,

and cancer hasn't

bothered me since.

Alright.

¶ ¶

Whoever said growing old

is not for sissies nailed it.

But the truth is we're aging

from before we're even born.

From when the first cells

multiplied and made new cells,

little defects

have been creeping in.

¶ ¶

85 years on, and your body

can't keep up the process

of renew and repair.

Muscle and bone are broken down

faster than they

can be replaced...

so your whole frame changes.

I'm an inch and a half

shorter now,

shoulders starting to hunch.

Stairs are a pain,

but I take my time,

and I'd climb almost anything

if Alice was at the top.

It's getting late.

We should get some sleep.

ALICE: I love you.

ADAM: And I love you.

ALICE: Mmm.

[laughs]

Goodnight.

ADAM: There's something

incredible

about growing old with someone.

Something that, frankly,

amazes me.

As we lie here in bed,

our nervous systems begin

mimicking each other.

[heartbeats]

Heartbeats rising

and falling together,

striving seemingly

telepathically

to fall into sync.

I don't think anyone yet knows

exactly how it happens,

but Alice and me are together

right to the heart.

¶ ¶

60 years since our wedding,

and I sleep soundly

knowing we've kept all the vows

we made that day.

All but the last one.

That always seemed so distant.

Till death do us part.

[heartbeat]

ADAM: The older you get,

the more time flies.

¶ ¶

ASTRONAUT:

...a beauty all its own.

ADAM: But stick around

long enough,

and you'll get to see things you

barely dreamed of come to pass.

[radio chatter]

Wow.

Can you believe this?

[cheering]

[snoring]

¶ ¶

And it's not just

the things you see.

Live to my age, and your heart

will have successfully pumped

more than 50 million

gallons of blood

through almost 400 million miles

of blood vessels.

Mankind may have

made it to Mars,

but my old heart has pumped

my blood as far as Jupiter,

and I'm not done yet.

¶ ¶

There's plenty to celebrate,

even if sometimes in big groups

it's a little hard to keep up.

The damaged hair cells

in your inner ear,

beaten up by a lifetime

of vibrations,

mean that bit by bit, the world

sounds a little further away.

[muffled conversations]

[laughter]

But I prefer to think about

what my body has done

and what it can still do, rather

than whine about what it can't.

[laughter]

[clinking]

Thank you for coming today.

I feel blessed for

having you all here.

I've had a good life,

a long life,

longer than I could ever

have imagined.

But I did a bit of math

recently,

and I would like

to share it with you.

It turns out I've drunk more

than 20,000 gallons of liquid

and eaten 70 tons of food,

blinked more than

900 million blinks,

slept for more than

a quarter of a century.

And, of course, lived through

four billion heartbeats.

[ding]

But as amazing

as I find these numbers,

like the candles on this cake,

they're just numbers.

The truth is the things that

really count can't be counted--

love...

wonder...

exhilaration...

hope...

kindness..

and joy.

So for those things,

I want to thank you all,

and I'd like to raise a glass.

To life!

It's one hell of a ride.

ALL: To life.

[laughter]

ADAM: Now, are we going to cut

this cake or just look at it?

¶ ¶

ADAM: Four billion heartbeats.

How many more to come?

Who knows?

But just as sure

as there was a first beat,

someday for certain

there will be a last.

[heartbeat]

When that last beat comes...

¶ ¶

[quiet rumble]

...my death will begin.

My lungs will rise and fall

one last time.

¶ ¶

My blood will stop circulating.

¶ ¶

One by one, my major organs

will close down.

¶ ¶

But then, for a few seconds,

they tell me I'll have

brain activity

associated with heightened

states of consciousness.

I wonder what I'll see.

¶ ¶

Ours is the journey

of a lifetime,

a transformation

beyond imagination

against odds

no gambler would take...

a living, breathing miracle...

just like billions of miracles

that came before

and billions more to come

on the path we all travel...

from cradle to grave.

[people chatting]

But that's not today.

And till that day comes,

I'll keep on living, laughing

and loving as best I can,

just like I've always done.

And that's what I've learned

in all my years.

Use it, live it, enjoy it,

'cause you never know how long

you're going to...