Time

A long time ago, back in the nineties, I took a sabbatical. In modern terms, this would kind of be a gap year, except I was a bit older. I’d tried a career that wasn’t working out. So I grabbed every job I could for around twelve months to save money, and took off for a half a year with my boyfriend at that time.

We had a contact in Bangkok and so stayed there for a few days before heading south. I’m from a cold place, and it was really nice to miss winter. We visited a few sites, and did a meditation retreat. We finally made it to an island and plunked down. I was twenty-four, I think, and had been working and going to school since I was sixteen. It wasn’t that I’d had such a hard life; it had been immeasurably better after sixteen, but I needed a reset.

In the south of Thailand, we stayed in a bungalow, on a beach, for nearly a month. I just remember learning what time was there. Time for most modern people is cut up, used, thrown away on stupid things. We didn’t have social media then, but there were plenty of other time wasters around. After a week or so, the island came alive. We wanted to see the sunrise here, the sunset there. This place had wonderful salads, that place had a book exchange. I wound up setting an alarm just not to miss something. In the evening, we played in the waves with the noctiluca scintillans, a type of flourescent algae. We talked with the Thais who managed the bungalows. I met a lot of Europeans who just went to Thailand for a month every year, because they could do that.

The last few days, I’ve been thinking about that time. On that beach, we met an Italian family and a French family. They had little girls, both around six or seven. The Italian girl had blond, long curly hair and round everything: round belly, bottom, shoulders. The French kid was all angles but beautiful, too. Sharp, defined face, bony arms, roller skate skinny. They played together, naked in the waves. It was beautiful to see.

Last weekend, the two oldest granddaughters of my partner reminded me of those girls. One is all curves, the other all angles. They are younger, at the moment, then those girls on the beach were, but it’s easy to see what’s coming.

I remember that time on the beach so well. I’d bought myself time. That was a very important lesson to learn. Work is only worth investing in if you love it, or it gives you meaning and sense, and it should never be the only thing in your life. And the goal of work, for me, is to have time to spend however I want to spend it (but maybe not spinning aournd and down into social media?) Time to think, dream and read is important. Time to get enough sleep. I think that was the first thing I learned on that beach; I am a happier, smarter person when I get enough sleep.

I’ve had friends get mad at me for saying that about work. “We don’t have that luxury to do the things we want to do; we have obligations” and sometimes they do. But most often, in my experience, is that they just don’t make time a priority. But that’s also western society, told to buy things to make us happy. No company is improving its quarterly returns by selling time to read a book, or watch the clouds go by.

My partner’s daughters put on an open air music festival every year. In the past, it seemed that they had enough help, but now with the quantity of grandchildren to take care of kids my partner and I lent a hand with the set up and breaking down. During the festival, his two oldest granddaughters ran around mostly naked, playing in water and mud (it was hot, they’d set up a shower/cooling station). It was beautiful to see them.

Where I am now, it’s hot, too hot to do much of anything in the afternoons. So I remember the lessons of the beach. Take time. Relax through the heat. Not every moment has to be filled with getting things done. I might just read a book this afternoon.