Waiting

There’92s a quality to waiting that seems to make time stand still.  Seconds seem to take a little bit longer, like an elastic drop of water that still clings to itself despite the law of gravity prodding it to fall.  Everything moves in slow-motion, steps, arm swings, even words forming in other people’92s mouths seem more enunciated.

We have been waiting ever since we were born;  for our mother’92s milk, for that exam, for that girl, for that break.  We would be happier we think, if what we’92ve been waiting for comes sooner than expected.  So we decided to speed things up, cars, processes, computers, innovation, even death. 

 

When we live in a time where everything moves at the speed of light, waiting becomes a burden, a liability.  We always want things to be done yesterday.  We are addicted to speed.  We want things quick, fast, and we want it now. 

 

We even deluded ourselves into thinking that we can reengineer love as well and save precious seconds or minutes by altering those variables that we can control.  We came up with speed dating, compressed the world through the world wide web, broke boundaries with technology.  Distance ceased to be an issue.  Everything got closer, more accessible. 

Have we succeeded?  Can we say that like instant coffee, we now have instant love?

There are some things that we can’92t put a booster on to crank up its speed.  Some things like to simmer in a boiling pot of time before they become fit for use– before they become tender, and open, and responsive. Like love.  We may have shown it the right directions, the right highways, but it’92s not a rational animal, it goes and stays wherever and whenever it wants to.  When things respond better to time than to pressure, waiting becomes a virtue.

As the song goes, ’93You cant hurry love, you just have to wait’94.