ASNN

hurry up and wait

I'm not good at waiting.

I'm good at looking back after the waiting is done - after all, it's been nearly 15 months since everything blew up in my marriage the first time, and almost 5 months since it blew up again and for the final time. I can look at those numbers, especially the 15 months, and remember everything that has happened in that time: so many mornings of the single parent dance in getting kids to school and taking care of my inbox; actually getting used to sleeping alone; filling out form after form to finalize the dissolution of our marriage. Looking back, I've been waiting for things to stabilize for a long, long time; but during those 15 months I often wondered if it would ever end.

Waiting for something is easy after the waiting is done. Frequently, one has no control over whether or not one's going to actually wait for something - if one wants it, one just has to wait, no negotiation. So the waiting itself might be easy, if you consider "inevitable" and "easy" to be remotely synonymous.

But that doesn't help at the beginning of the wait. If I'm waiting 6+ months, say until late September/early October, for something I desire passionately right now... well, all of a sudden those 180+ days seem like an eternity. It's like putting up the Christmas tree in late June and populating it with the fantastic presents you might expect... IN DECEMBER. Who can curb such curiosity, such longing for that time?!

And yet some things in life are simply worth waiting for. And sometimes six months seems like a drop in the bucket after getting (limping) along for 2.5x that time without my helpmate. Why wait six months after waiting so long? Only because that's the way it has to be - and "has to be" is simply something to which I've become accustomed. But that's a blessing in disguise - where waiting is necessary, I am comfortable with doing what is "necessary".

Besides, what bearing does six months have on eternity? Let me act according to what is eternal and right within that eternal timeframe, not the temporal, not the next six months.

I may prefer otherwise, but I can wait.

Posted by pcg at March 14, 2005 11:53 PM