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After a long, chatty call with my daughter the other night, she mentioned that it was time for her nightly routine. She and my son-in-law apparently do the New York Times crossword puzzle together every night before bed.

“This is what I am now,” she said, not a trace of irony in her voice.

I think her implication was that this was about age, that she had now reached a point where passive, quiet entertainment was what she desired at the end of a long day. This is a joke we all make, over and over, self-deprecation the only weapon we have against the inevitable.

We’re old and boring, we...