Yet genes alone don't write the whole story. What shaped Emma's trajectory was above all her state of mind. Her quiet resistance in the face of life's storms — she lost a young child — without ever letting herself be swallowed up by grief.
When she died in 2017, the Guinness World Records officially named her the oldest person on the planet, and the last survivor born in the 1890s.
Perhaps his real secret lay in this rare ability to live by his own rules, day in and day out, until his last breath.
Aging well always begins with the art of remaining fully yourself.
