Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Robert Grudin: boredom's fast time and slow time

II.23

"Our sense of the slowness or speediness of time often depends on the size of the time-frame we happen to be considering.   It is possible, for example, for us to be simultaneously amazed at the slowness of minutes and the speediness of years.  Oddly enough, this pathetic double amazement bespeaks a single cause: our inability to make proper use of the present.  For although minutes spend in boredom or anxiety pass slowly, they nonetheless add up to years which are void of memory."

-- Robert Grudin --
from Time and the Art of Living

That's  why I usually carry a book with me whenever I'm out and around.  It's amazing how quickly time passes when I pick up a book and read while having to wait in line or for someone to appear.  Moreover, I also find I'm in a much better humor if I spent the time reading rather than fuming over having to wait.  Time always seems to pass quickly when I'm doing something, yet, when I look back, I find those days seem "longer" than those in which I did little or nothing.

Tiz a puzzlement.

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