Time

Time is an interesting thing.  We live in an age of time saving devices all the way from cars to computers to email.  Yet we seem to be more pressed for time than any generation before.  Even our movies are fast paced compared to 50 years ago.  Are there really more demands on our time, or have we just decided that we should fit more into our day?

I have neglected this blog for the last week because I was moving and didn't have "time."  Maybe that is a true statement and maybe it isn't.  Although I can't think of too much wasted effort, there was still the several hour trip to Wal-Mart (twice) to find some kind of window coverings.  I wanted to go cheap, but I was picky too.  What color?  What rod?  And we won't even discuss picking out a new mop or plastic containers for the cupboards.

I could argue that these were necessary items and that the trip to the store was important.  I would, however, have a hard time defending the length of time I took to get it just right.  Does all that really matter?  Our society these days often says it is.  And these demands take time.

Despite my busy schedule this last week, I found some things that take up my time are actually unneeded.  How often a day do you check email, for instance?  I know I usually check it several times a day.  But with getting settled and waiting until the internet could be hooked up, I only checked it, at best, once a day.  It was not a problem, except once.  Therein lies the rub, that "once."  I was sent an email from my editor with a final version of an article for my review.  It was being sent off to the presses the next morning.  I didn't look at that email until mid-morning the next day.  Luckily, I got it to her in time, but it could have easily gone the other way.

So, what would I conclude about how busy our lives have become?  I guess I buy into it . . . in part.  Where others are involved, a mutual understanding needs to exist about time constraints and commitments.  Where the choice is really mine, like with my window coverings, I can choose the allotment of time I want to spend.  In that sense it is a matter priorities.

Given all of this, in the end, I would have to revise my statement that I didn't blog last week because I had no time to I didn't blog because I didn't make it a priority, I chose to put others things first.  If I had it to do over again, I would still make those same choices, but I would recognize that they were conscious choices, just like the choice I am making now - to blog amid piles of unpacked boxes.