It's About Time

LIFE is meted out in time...whether you adhere to it or not. The bus comes at 8:47am. Taxes are due April 15th. The flight leaves at 7:32pm. Your brother's birthday is October 18th. The New Year rings in at 12 midnight. Movies start, trains depart, hair appointments are scheduled, bill deadlines are set. For the most part, we function based on the things we have scheduled in our lives. And it's easy to say that you're not bound by time...and that you work on your own schedule.

But the truth is...no matter how you look at it...there are general rules of time you ARE bound to. The bus isn't there at 8:51am. It left 4 minutes ago. On October 19th, the only thing that applies is a card with belated birthday wishes. And in your effort NOT to be bound by time, you find that you have to reschedule your hair appointment for 3 weeks down the road, at the next available opening. Your intentions could be the best around, but if you're late, you're late. There really is no way around it. For better or worse, 'time' is a part of our lives and the sooner we learn to adhere to it, the easier our lives will be.

I started thinking alot about this idea yesterday as I sat at rehearsal. This rule of 'time' is applicable to things that can't be measured by clocks or calendars or Day Timers. Thank You's have a window of time to be expressed in. Bless You's aren't really meant to be delivered an hour or a day or a week past a sneeze. And as I realized yesterday, apologies, in whatever form they come, really should be delivered as soon after the indiscretion as possible.

As a responsible adult, if you know better (and I would hope most adults would), and yet you still let the offense sit and simmer and fester before you decide to apologize, then shame on you for missing your deadline. Shame on you again for thinking a half-assed apology and 3 hours of acting goofy does away with 6 weeks of avoiding responsibility, mis-managing of time, condescension, and general over-all unpleasantness. And shame on you for having to be told that your best option is to just swallow your pride and apologize. Shame on you for thinking you were going to make your 3:49pm flight....when you didn't show up until 4:07pm.

The thing is....life is about time. Try not to be late.