Of course we have to drag ourselves out of bed each day and go earn a living just like everyone else, but even that seems more laid back than elsewhere.
In a previous life, I worked the fast paced life of a business owner in Orlando, FL where I created textbooks for educational publishers. It was kind of hectic and almost always a 24/7 kind of deal. After 15 years of success and burnout, I closed that business and retired, wrote and published a book, discovered I didn’t have near enough money to stay retired and started looking for a job. I wanted a “job” this time. Let some other poor schmuck deal with headaches.
Then my parents had some troubles up here in beautiful Southern Maryland, so not being tied to anything in particular, my wife and I packed up in the land of Mickey Mouse and headed north for a long road trip, landing at my parent’s house in Breezy Point Beach in Calvert.
It was there I discovered that time in Southern Maryland was all screwed up! The days here seemed to drag on forever. Minutes with the family, sitting around the tube watching the Redskins took hours, days took weeks, and weeks, took months. Weird!
So I did some analysis. What things made time stand still and what events made time fly? Back in Orlando, time always flew. I’d get up in the morning, and the next thing I knew I was crashing into bed, exhausted – not here.
I discovered that when I would go out on my dad’s boat and fish for Rock, that time went fast. Before I knew it on those days, it was time to bring it home.
Then when I would be sitting on the porch, watching the tourists go by, time stood absolutely still. Weird!
Then I started writing my second book and time started to speed up. I dubbed the non-writing times as “Slow Time.” The fast-moving time was dubbed “Fast Time.” I even wrote a chapter in the book referencing the phenomenon, but that’s another column.
I discovered, though, that all of us experience slow and fast time. Think back to when you were a kid on Christmas Eve. Tell me you didn’t experience Slow Time! It took forever for Christmas morning to arrive.
Then if you’ve ever watched a sporting event, rooted for your team and your team was up with 2 minutes to go, that clock took forever to get to zero. Conversely, if you were down, had the ball and there were only two minutes left, time flew – nothing could stop zero and the end of the game – Fast Time.
Maybe old Einstein was on to something, but I’m not sure the time travel he talked about is quite the same as living in Southern Maryland. I’m sure it’s not as much fun!