It’s almost happening again. Less so this week, but last week I felt it creeping up on me. Habit. More than habit, routine. The same thing, day in day out. It’s a great way to lose track of time, and a great way to cruise through a week of school, or any time when you would rather be doing something else. But that’s not what I’m trying for this summer. Days need to be memorable, or else you lose them.
I always think of blowing through days by way of habit as “tuck and roll”. If you’ll bear with the metaphor, it works pretty well. When life is good, you’re walking through life. You’re not in a rush to get anywhere, and you notice things around you in greater detail than you normally would. When you’re working towards a goal, you’re running through life, and you see things rush by you, but you only pay them a slight bit of attention, since you’re looking at the goal. When you just want to the days to disappear, you tuck and roll, and suddenly everything is a blur, and you can’t really see anything right – maybe you see something, but its upside down – and then suddenly, you’ve traveled all this distance without really knowing how.
Routine is a great way to do this, if that’s the goal. Same thing every day makes days blur together. They’re easily forgotten, which makes it seem like less time doing whatever you’re doing. But I’m not trying to tuck and roll, I just tripped. I’m glad I’m out of the swing of things again, and I’m going to have to try to keep it that way. The other night I found myself with nothing to do, and it was a beautiful night, and I thought about going for a bike ride. I didn’t, but next time I will.