Talking to My Kids About Death

My 4-year-old daughter Shuli recently asked me how old I was. We were behind our apartment building with her brother Yosef, killing time on a Sunday afternoon. I told her that I was 33 years old. After a moment, she said, "When Yosef is 33, you're going to die." My kids often speculate on the exact timing of my demise. They know that people die when they're old, as their great-grandfather did last summer. But what counts as "old"? I'm a grown-up, so I'm at least a little old. When Yosef is 33, I'll be a lot old. That's when Shuli thinks that I'll drop dead, maybe even on the day he turns 33 itself, at his birthday party.