Time
What will you do with your one wild and precious half hour?
Hello Friends,
Time is a strange thing. It is uncompromising, bound by the laws of physics, yet it is also completely relative.
We say things like, “Time flies when you’re having fun.” and “A watched pot never boils.” This point to the human perception of time. We never want our good time to end, and what we desire can never come fast enough. That’s why the trip home always seems shorter than the trip there.
But no matter what we perceive, 24 hours is still 1,440 minutes and each of those minutes is 60 seconds. The earth will continue to spin. The sun will rise and set. Sometimes this is comforting, sometimes terrifying.
Poet Mary Oliver asks us, “What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” It feels like a grand question demanding a big answer. I could spend time contemplating all I might do with the days I have here on this side of the dirt, but sometimes I like to take the big questions and make them bite-sized…
I came across this from a cartoonist for the New Yorker, that asked me only to consider the next 30 minutes.
“What will I do with my one wild and precious half hour?”
I laughed, and then I made a list.
Journal
Fold laundry
Empty the dishwasher
Pull up the dying zucchini plant in the garden
Pull a few weeds while I’m at it.
Write a to-do list. Include: calling one friend I haven’t talked to in a long time.
Schedule a mammogram (it is breast cancer awareness month)
Take a nap
Google about the mole that suddenly popped up on my chest.
Avoid doom-scrolling about said mole.
Read
Leave 30 minutes early for my 10:30 appointment so I can listen to a podcast in the parking lot.
This is where I am today. Thank you for listening.
xoxo,
Emily
Your Journal Prompt for Today
Read This Week
Carrie Soto if Back! by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Carrie Soto (from Malibu Rising) is back! If it weren't for Daisy Jones and the Six and Malibu Rising, this would have been a full 4 stars, but I can't help but compare, so I'm giving this one 3.5 (more)
What are you reading?
Links to Ponder
It’s the second mouse that gets the cheese… When the second half of a well-known saying contradicts the first half. (Atoms of the Universe)
Dear Sugar answers impossible questions. “wishing you a thousand glimmering spider webs.” (Dear Sugar)
They call us witches when we dare take control (The Audacity)
I have been on a major podcast run lately here are three I have really enjoyed:
Funny Cuz It’s True - Hysterical. At its core, we have a curious comedian interviewing famous people. I don’t want to over-explain because I won’t do it justice. Just listen.
We Were Three - From the storytellers of Serial comes another engrossing series about family history and forgiveness.
Legacy of Speed - Do you think you know the story behind the two fists in the air at the 1968 Olympics? Do you think you know how they came to be the fastest humans in the world? Do you think you know what happened to them after? You probably don’t.
Do nothing on your next vacation (Cup of Jo)
When yellow memories turn blue (My Sweet Dumb Brain)
Can you tell how old Paul Rudd is? (Vulture)
If you only have time for one thing… My writing friend Margery Berger wrote a gorgeous piece about feeling beautiful again after a double mastectomy when she found out she had the BCA1 gene mutation. Perfect for Breast Cancer Awareness Month (Huffington Post)