the.com/calcification
The body's way of filing something under permanent, whether you asked or not.
means The buildup of calcium salts in soft tissue, turning something that used to bend into something that just sits there, hardened.
from From Latin calx ("lime, limestone") — the same root that gives us "calcium" and "calculus" (literally "small stone," since Romans counted using pebbles). French chemists bolted on the "-ify/-fication" pattern (to make into) in the 1800s as the modern sense of mineral deposits in tissue was being worked out. So at its root, calcification just means "turning to stone" — which is exactly what it does to arteries, cartilage, and old garden hoses alike.
- not just bones
- arteries, cartilage, even brain tissue can calcify
- root cause
- calcium phosphate crystals settling where soft tissue used to be
- slow motion
- can take years, which is why checkups exist
- metaphor magnet
- also means ideas or habits hardening past the point of change