The 17th-century writer François de La Rochefoucauld really hit home when he said, "The only thing constant in life is change." Dang, what a smart guy!

They didn't even have computers four centuries ago! I don't know about you, but having to keep abreast of the latest software (puro update!) is driving me crazy. It seems that as soon as I finally get the hang of one program, I'm forced to learn a new one. I'm too old for this nonsense!

I'm sure that age has something to do with my inability to handle these changes. My children don't have a problem being dictated to by all of these technological gadgets. I'm forever being humbled when I have to ask them for help. And boy, do they know it! Forget about my giving them a time out—if I want help with my computer, I'm the one who has to behave.

Of course La Rochefoucauld wasn't referring to technology with his sage comment on life's constant change. He knew, as we all have learned if we've been around awhile, that nothing is forever. We all get old, sick and eventually die. In between we bumble along, trying to adapt to the different obstacles that we encounter each day. Some of us are better at dealing with life's uncertainty than others. It seems as if young people are able to handle life's transitions best, probably because they're too busy to realize that life is finite.

It isn't just technology that makes me anxious—it's life in general. Everything that I learned to believe in when I was young—religion, government, family and relationships—is so different now. The fundamentals still hold true, but there seem to be strings attached to everything, little caveats that we must continually heed to in order to get along in this world. The hardest part about change is dealing with it in other people. Think about all the people we've been close to who are no longer in our lives. I can, in fact, handle the computer stuff and the crazy world around me, but the changes in other people are what I find hardest to accept.

I recently read The Gathering by Anne Enright, which resonated for me on this topic of change. The book was the winner of the 2007 Man Book Prize. If you're looking for a quality read this summer, I highly recommend that you get a copy. Enright methodically navigates the reader through one family's many dilemmas and dramas as its members strive for some semblance of harmony. One character comes to a profound realization when she says, "People do not change, they are merely revealed."