Aging Capriciously

Summer is now in the air in Minnesota but I think it is still Spring I love best. Spring, the time of year when we start thinking about taking out the lawnmowers, planning vacations, worrying about taxes, planting flowers and getting outside more. The cold weather and short days are behind us and we get peeks at the eventual coming of summer. The buds have appeared on the trees; snow is gone, lent is over and green becomes the dominant color. The apple blossoms, tulips and lilacs are georgeous this year. Each Spring seems to have its own personality. Spring signifies renewal and rebirth. The cycle of life starts again with Spring.

For each of us, Spring brings a different set of meanings and a different response. Some of us will think of romance. Springtime in Paris seems magical and many of us have visions (or perhaps memories of visiting Paris in the Spring. Imagine romance, beauty, and Spring in one of the most beautiful cities in the world. For me, I start thinking of motorcycling. Between my wife and I, we have five bikes that we put away each winter. Spring is the beginning of riding season. However, first we need to do oil changes and tune-ups on each bike. Some will start easily and others will not.

If you are a gardener, no doubt you are making your rounds to the various greenhouses and flower shops. There are so many different varieties to choose from. Each has its own beauty and grace. You will have to get your soil ready and decide how much space to allocate to each and when the best time to plant is. In Minnesota, you must be careful not to plant too early. As I am writing this, we are just past a week where May saw us having more snow despite the fact we are well into spring. But what does the calendar really know about the weather. It is only a dumb piece of cardboard and paper. The real time is what I am looking at out my window today.

Then there are those who hate winter. If you fall into this category, you may be flying back from your safe nest someplace to the colder climates which are just beginning to thaw out. We call these people snowbirds in Minnesota. They fly south every winter like the ducks and geese only to return when Spring comes again. They would love Minnesota if they could leave out the five months between November and March that we call Winter.

What does Spring mean to you? When you think of the Springtime, what memories does it evoke? What do you look forward to doing most in the Spring? What hobbies, plans, dreams or desires does Spring bring for you each year? Has your concept of Spring changed over the years? What will Spring bring for you this year? You will have five more weeks of it until Summer.

Timelessness is that state when time does not seem to matter or when time seems suspended. It is those points, episodes or events in our life when time does not seem to flow or when we are totally unaware of the passage of time. I remember spending ten days in the Boundary Waters in Northern Minnesota. It took about a week for me to stop thinking of time and to stop looking at my watch. After that, I was almost totally unaware of the passage of time. Life seemed to slow down so that each moment I focused on could have lasted forever. Only the shifting of my mind caused any movement in the world or so it seemed. Schedules, to-do-lists, appointments all disappeared.

I moved when I wanted to, paddled when and where I wanted to, ate and rested when I wanted to and not by the movements of the hands on my watch. Time became non-existent except by virtue of the sun, moon and stars. Clock time, machine time, watch time, 24 hour schedules no longer existed for me. After leaving the Boundary Waters, it took me a few days for reentry. I had to reenter the world of schedules and work-time. I had to adjust again to time where we take a break on a schedule and count the days until the weekend.

Have you ever experienced a state of timelessness? When was the last time that time no longer mattered for you? What events or episodes in your life have evoked a state of timelessness for you? What where they like? Did you find them enjoyable? Do you wish you could have more experiences of timelessness? How often do you have any experiences of timelessness? Do you suppose this is a skill that could be developed or do you think it just happens? What if you could develop a skill to create timelessness whenever you wanted to? What would life be like for you if you could suspend time whenever you wanted or needed to?

And I think I will keep you here,
deep within my heart.
Today…tomorrow…forever…and a day! — (From “Forever and a Day”, by Cindy Heavican)

Songs can tell us a great deal about the feelings that are associated with time.  Forever and a day!  What a beautiful thought.  When we marry someone, our thoughts are like in this song.  Our hope is that our love and our happiness together will last long after our earthly bodies have withered away.  Poems and stories are full of tales of love that have somehow transcended time.  Some of these stories, like Romeo and Juliet, are now timeless themselves.

We would all like to think that our love will last forever and a day.  We marvel at those people for whom this seems to hold true. We may know a special couple who never seem to tire of each other and who are always loving and caring towards each other. Perhaps a father and mother who have been married for sixty some odd years and who still seem like newlyweds.  Or friends who despite the longevity of their marriage treat each day as thought it was the first day of their marriage.

What distinguishes these unique relationships from so many others wherein apathy and even hatred sometimes replace love?  The TV, newspapers and crime novels are full of stories where love turned to hatred and one spouse killed another.  Can we blame time?  Does familiarity breed contempt?  Do we simply get tired of people like we get tired of the same old song repeatedly heard? I want to say no, let’s not blame time.  If we must find something to blame, perhaps we must start with ourselves.  Time can age all things and cause them to decay and rot.  Time also allows all things to be renewed, repaired and restored.

Questions to Reflect On:

What happens if we don’t renew ourselves and our relationships?  Of course, they just get older and not better.  They may rot from within.  Think about yourself today.  Are you renewing, repairing or restoring yourself?  Or are you just getting older and decaying?  We can make a choice.  We cannot turn the clock back but we can move forward with it.

Book time is my favorite time. This is when I am already past the startup of a new novel and I find the time to just sit down and relax with it. I often go into an old bedroom in our house as it somehow seems more peaceful. It might be just before going to bed or sometimes when I have nothing to do. The world never seems more peaceful. It feels like hiding in a cave. When I was a child, book time was when I would go to the library. I discovered libraries at an early age and it was like discovering paradise.

Libraries were peaceful and quiet and full of all the ideas, fantasies, mysteries and great things of the world. I fell in love with books there. I probably love books more than anything in the world. I love them not only because of what they represent, but because of where they can take you and what they can make you. When I was young, knowledge was power and information was a precious resource. The balance of power has shifted now due to modern technology and the internet.

We seem to live in a society that seems more and more obsessed by sports. It is a society where star athletes are heroes and computer geeks are nerds. It is a society that places more value on baseballs, footballs and basketballs than on books and reading. Perhaps foolishly, I dream of a society where towns have signs up for leading academic students and not just for the “football champions of 03.” I dream of a society where music coaches and art teachers are as highly paid as NCAA athletic coaches. I dream of a society where as many students show up to watch the debating matches and chess matches as show up for the basketball games. I dream of a society where there are no such thing as nerds and geeks and where brains are as exciting as muscles.

Do you read enough? Do you value ideas as much as you value “who won the Superbowl?” Do you spend as much time reading as you do watching TV? Do you concern yourself with politics and culture as much as you do with popular sports and Hollywood celebrities? Do your children? Why not? Do you think your life might be different if you valued ideas more? What might change?

Do you know what “Mad” time is? It is time we waste when we are mad at others or the world. Road Rage is an extreme example of “Mad” time. How many lives have been wasted because of one single incident on a highway that took less than five seconds? Yet, when Mad time takes over, a single incident can turn into wasted hours, weeks and even wasted lives. Mad time has a notorious propensity to escalate and keep on escalating. One single incident turns neighbors into lifelong enemies. One single incident turns friends, lovers and family members into people that now hate and despise each other. Mad time is a vicious gift that keeps on giving. It gives more and more time to continue hating and loathing and despising others. Nothing is more pernicious or insidious than Mad time. Of course, you are right. Of course, it was not your fault. Of course, they were being jerks. Of course, they should apologize. How much time will you now spend thinking about what they did wrong and how you were insulted or maligned?

Have you ever sent an email that you wanted to retrieve? Did it cause you problems when you could not retrieve it? How much time did it take to send the email versus the time it cost you to fix the problems you created by sending it? Have you ever said something you wish you could take back? How much time did it take you to make up for this one lapse of patience. This is Mad time at work. Mad time can consume us.

In business, one looks at costs versus benefits and it is called a Cost-Benefit Analysis. Perhaps we should have a process for doing at “Mad Time Analysis.” Before we shoot off that angry letter, before we yell at the other driver, before we say those angry words, we need to do a cost benefit on the time it will cost us to make amends or the time that it could take out of our lives to repair the damage our actions might cause. How much time will it save or waste versus the time it took us to be angry and retaliatory?

Sometimes, you can never undue the damage that one minute of haste or one minute of anger can do. Are you a Mad-aholic? Do you get off on spending Mad time and then dealing with it? What if you had less Mad time in your life? Can you start reducing your Mad time by redirecting your anger? What could you do when you are angry rather than retaliate? Think about how much better your life would be with less Mad time.

Anticipatory time is that time when we are waiting for something to happen. It is when we know in advance that something will happen. Whether it is good or bad, when we are anticipating something, it can seem like forever. Time can move very slowly when we are in an anticipatory mood. Those of us who like to plan may try to control these events. I plan my vacations two to three years ahead. I love the anticipation. For instance, Karen (my spouse) and I had decided to go to Peru in two years. It was fun for me to think what it would be like to climb Machu Picchu and to take the train in Peru. I am anticipating that we will take a small boat ride up the Amazon River. In my mind, everything works fine. I anticipate no problems. I planned my first overseas trip twenty five years ago. Since the first, Karen and I have gone on 17 trips to 29 different countries. Each trip was planned more than two years in advance. We post pictures of where we want to go, buy books, get maps, contact people, get local newspapers and get more and more excited as the day draws near. In many ways, our anticipatory time goes very fast. There are so many details and so much to work out to make sure that everything goes as we anticipate.

However, regardless of how much we try to control the time in our lives, there are inevitably events we cannot control. On Monday morning, your boss says “I want to see you in my office on Friday.” Your annual performance evaluation, an important presentation or an upcoming court date are just a few of the many different events that will create “anticipatory time” in our lives. Some of these events will not be ones that we would choose. These will create “negative” anticipatory time. I call this the time we have to wait that is not fun and that creates stress in our lives. Positive anticipatory time may also go slow but it is time that is fun to think about and where we are anxious for the time to move fast. In both cases, we want the time to go by but in one case, it is with positive anticipation and the other with negative anticipation.

What do you like to anticipate in your life? Are you in control over your anticipations or do you just go with the flow? Would more planning help you to have more fun with anticipation? What can you do to minimize the “negative” anticipation in your life? Are you leading the type of balanced life that helps to minimize stress and problems? If not, how can you get more balance in your life? A balanced life will have less negative and more positive anticipatory time.

This is the best time in the world. There is no better time than now. Perhaps today it might sound foolish to say this. Perhaps tomorrow it might sound foolish. To some it will always sound foolish. There are those who might say it is looking at the world with rose colored glasses. Others might attribute it to a foolish optimism. Very few would see it as a statement of realism. It will never be possible to prove it as a statement of fact. Yet, it determines to a large extent what we do with our lives and what we attempt to do in the world.

When you believe that the world feels wonderful, it changes your whole perspective on life. On the days when I can grasp this thought, there is no other place I want to be. Things are going just right, all is well. I feel healthy, happy and contented. I am not unhappy with the right wing or left wing or chaos anywhere in the world. I can just accept the world for what it is. It is a wonderful feeling. I sometimes wish the feeling could last forever. I think of the quote from Dickens that: “this is the best of all possible worlds.” Where else could I go?

If we look around us, we can see a beautiful place full of beautiful people and extraordinary places and opportunities. Of course, we can see the opposite if we are minded to. There will always be war, hatred, killing and violence. It is part of human nature. But are you part of the problem or part of the solution? If you are not doing your share to end the problems of the world, why complain about them? Take some time to end violence, to end poverty and to end war. But for today, try to find only the good out there.

See if you can find three things that make you happy or three good things that you like about the world. Try to be aware today of the good things in your life. Write them down and look at them again when you wake up tomorrow. See if you can feel why this is the best of all possible times and the best of all possible worlds. Tomorrow can be even better. Can you make the choice?

Time Capsules!  I want to open a time capsule.  When I was a small boy, I was truly fascinated by the whole idea of a time capsule.  It seemed so Buck Rogers like.  You take parts of present civilization, put them in a non-destructible container, bury it in the ground and then 1000 years later, you open it up. The commonplace of the past are not the treasures of the future.  I did not believe anything could be more interesting.

I hoped someday that I could be present at the opening of one.  I thought surely sometime during my lifetime, a time capsule from the past would be opened and I could be present when it was opened.  How exciting it would be!  I would be able to see what people of generations long ago thought was important.  The messages and memories sent by the people from generations past to the generations of the future.  Only now I could be there to be part of history. I longed to find out what wisdom the people from the past would have to share with us now.  What knowledge had been forgotten and would now be revived. What treasures would be revealed from the capsule.

Well, I see they are still burying time capsules and occasionally I see that a time capsule has been opened.  Sadly, I still have not been present when any were opened.  Either my timing or my location has not been right.  Perhaps it is time that I made my own time capsule.  Have you ever thought about making a time capsule for your children or grandchildren?  Why not?  You could just take a large Tupperware container for the capsule.  Make sure anything that you put in it is well wrapped in baggies or some type of plastic to prevent moisture from getting in.  Date it with a permanent ink marker.  Find a place to bury it and put some sort of marker on the spot.  Find a place on the internet where time capsules are listed and post yours.

Questions to Reflect On:

Now comes the fun part.  What would you put in it?  What treasures, thoughts or ideas would you like your grandchildren to know about you many years from now?  Where would you “bury” it for them to open?  When would you permit them to open it?  Think of the reactions on their faces when they found the messages and treasures you left for them.  No doubt you would make some little boy or girl very happy.  I know I would be if I opened your time capsule.

PS:  Since I wrote this there has been a proliferation of “on-line time capsule sites.”  You might find this one helpful.

Neptune Time Capsules

Crying Time is more acceptable for women than men.  Nevertheless, even men have their crying times.  Crying time most likely occurs over a tragic death, when we lose a relationship, attend a funeral or feel badly about something we did.  Paradoxically, many people cry when they are happy, for instance at weddings.  Others cry when they are angry.

For men, there is less crying time than for women.  I have often wondered what the purpose of crying is or how the function developed.  What evolutionary or biological purpose does crying serve?  There are those that say that only music truly sets us apart from lower creatures, but do animals cry?  I have seen sadness in some of my pets, but I cannot say I have ever seen an animal crying.  For myself, I cannot say that I cry very much.  This is not to say that I never cry.  I have cried tears of sadness and tears of pain but I cannot remember ever crying tears of joy or tears of anger.  There are certain stories that will always bring tears to my eyes.  “The Little Match-girl” is one of them.  I have never seen a production of the story or read the story without crying.

When my first wife and I separated, it seems like I spent one entire week crying.  Crying seemed purposeless at the time.  However, after the release of disappointment and emotional uplifting, I was leading my life again solo without looking back and trying to resurrect the relationship.  The crying allowed me to let go of things and to move forward with my future.  So maybe crying would be a better release for many people than the displays of anger and abuse we often witness in our society.  I can’t say that thoughts of anger and retribution at finding my wife in bed with another man did not cross my mind.  They certainly did but I did not act on them.  I did not take an AR 15 and go out shooting as many people as I could find.  Maybe we need to encourage more crying in men and less shooting?

Questions for Reflection: 

What would it take to make crying more acceptable for men as well as for women?  Would it decrease abuse and rage in our society if we encouraged men to spend more crying time?  What about teenagers and the problems with school violence and suicide?  Could more crying time be an antidote to these problems?  What role does crying play in your life?  Do you find crying to be helpful?  Do you cry enough?