Time

This seems like an appropriate night to write about time.  Time passing.  Time going too ssllloowwwwllyyy.  Wasting time.  Patience.

You get my drift.

I think my perception of time has changed so much in the past few years.  Partially because of the transitions in my life, you know, like kids growing up and the changes that come with simply getting older.  But my perception has shifted mostly because of death.  Obviously Bill's death.  Friend's and family's deaths as well.  Too many deaths.

And it's made me think.  Or actually it's made me quit thinking and start feeling.  Kind of this strange intuitive feeling that I can't define very well.

I just can't follow conventional thinking anymore when it comes to time.  Societal or cultural time frames don't feel authentic to me.  They feel contrived and forced.  Seriously, who can really tell me when I should start or finish or wait or get over anything?  That's my choice and it's dictated only by me.

In the past few years I have also learned that I am so very gullible.  I take on too much.  I get my feelings hurt easily.  I often have undefined boundaries.  And I have absolutely NO patience.  (now stop that snickering, my dear friends who pointed this out to me!)  Because of these characteristics, time is not my friend.  Usually.

But I'm starting to learn.  Slowly.

 I think I'm also realizing that I've been a little too precious in my adult life.  Bill took awful good care of me and I don't think there were many times I didn't get what I wanted, when I wanted it.  Or if I didn't get my way, he was awful good at convincing me why I shouldn't.  And then I tried to accept that something didn't go my way.  Within the life we so carefully created I was able to manipulate time to best fit me and what I wanted.  This contrived control made me have the most unrealistic idea of what was considered a normal time frame for just about everything.  I think that's where most of my impatience comes from.

What the heck is considered normal when dealing with time anyway?

It's a struggle for me, this patience thing.  I'm a doer by nature, a fixer, and an extraordinarily impatient waiter.  When I make up my mind about something I'm all in.  Right now.  Waiting is painful and feels like failure to me. I'll say it again:  when I make up my mind about something I do not wait.  Ugh.  Not the greatest attribute.

Yeah, I'm a jumper for sure.  

But I've come to realize that there is a world outside of my old world and there are, gasp, other people who I must defer to.  And the deference includes sometimes accepting a different time frame than my own.  And that's not a bad thing.

Patience is my goal.  Nothing more.  I told a friend one time that he must "trust the process of life and not rush trying to live."  Maybe I need to take my own advice.