Ide Ward was going on 120 years of age when he died early in 1982; a doctor said he died "just of old age," but George Will of the Washington Post called his long life a "triumph of the spirit."  Will says, "Aging, like a lot of other common things (life, love, memory, the existence of the universe, the infield fly rule), remains a mystery. But many gerontologists believe that, absent disease or imprudent living, an individual ages according to his or her genetically controlled ‘clock.' A scientist says that, ideally, we should live fairly healthily and then go ‘poof' rather than go…