I stole this from the Internet this morning at around 0230 hours. I woke up not yet in the middle of my second 120 hour shift, with only 24 hours off between them, as you never miss a chance to hit the head in the fire service, and checked the time. Away form the firehouse I am not concerned with time, but on the off chance my alarm was about to let its presence be known I looked at my phone. I saw a message from someone special in a past life and my mind, as it is prone to do, began to wander. We have spoken only twice in the last decade or so.
Ten something years gone in the blink of eye as they say. Time always travels so fast in retrospect and the old adage of time flying as you get older is just an easier way to express that. When you're a kid you have no responsibilities and very little time to compare time against so it seems to drag on. Put a few years on and there is obviously more life to compare to and therefore time just seems to slip away. In reality time is a constant and is not actually accelerating, but the feeling is terrifying on some level.
We all get wrapped up in responsibilities, real and imagined, wants, needs, and desires, and we forget to stop and enjoy our laps around the sun. This has been a struggle of mine for a few years and is one of the foundational tenets of this effort. Taking the time to write and share my experiences is both therapeutic and serves as a placeholder of sorts for some of the experiences I've survived 😉
Time. In reality it is all we actually have, and the amount is both finite and unknown. Scary.
A few years back I was standing on the shore and saw a flock of pelicans flying overhead and became aware that I was completely involved with that flock of pelicans and for that moment, on that shore, time stood still. The constant, incessant, beat of the ticking clock held no sway over me for I was truly in the moment, just me and my favorite sea birds and I realized I was alive. From that moment on I have tried to find something in everyday, a great cup of coffee, the perfect fall breeze, a loving embrace that seems to linger for just the right amount of time, really, really good BBQ, to become lost in, to stop and be one with the experience so that I can remember that day. Without finding something that stands out all of the days just march on at a seemingly accelerated rate and then you're out of them.
It is this effort of mine that led me to the various versions of my personal philosophy: I wake up every day and take that day as it comes with the driving realization that it is not one more day, as the other old adage advises, but in reality it is one less day. It is the realization of each day being one less day that I feel best sums up how I now view life - Live While You're Alive.
Take the time to do what you enjoy. Quit being a servant of your phone, of your job, of the need to see what everyone else is doing. Take time to be you. Take time to pet a dog's belly, to take a walk, catch up with an old friend, eat something different.
Put it on your calendar and get out there. The time is now.
Scott
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