Time is not money. All the slick guys in their suits, peppering their lingo with "time is money!" Hurry! Money!
It's not true. I feel bad for them. Cheapening their time like that.
I know this because I'm the master at losing money. I have very clever ways of making my money explode into dust. Like magic.
I can make money, then lose it, but I know I can make it back again. We'll see. I'm a human money roller coaster.
But if I lose even five minutes of my time, I will never make it back. It's gone forever.
I have never once figured out how to make those five minutes back and I've tried. Even begged. Even cried.
Like trying to hold onto a cup-worth of water with my bare hands. Slip through the fingers, disappear on the ground. Gone.
If I'm five minutes late picking up one of my daughters, those are five minutes of their lives I will never see. Five minutes of twinkle. Lost.
If I spend five more minutes on a phone call with someone I don't really like as opposed to five minutes with Claudia then no matter how much I try from now until the day I die I will never have those five minutes back with her.
Five minutes of laughter evaporated into the air.
Please give me those five minutes back.
"NO!"
Please?
"NEVER!"
Losing twenty dollars is something that's annoying. "DRAT!"
Losing a single moment with someone I love is the wrong note in the musical composition of life.
But fortunately so far in my life I've been given a very beautiful gift. A gift I always have to remember to treasure. Thank you, universe, for this amazing gift.
The next note of music. And the choice to make it a work of art.
(Photo courtesy of Delwin Campbell)