Time is Too Slow for Those Who Wait

I’m not a patient person.  I have never been a patient person.  If I get my mind set on something I want it right now this minute.  I have always been that way.  Don’t dangle something in front of me and say it’s going to happen because I can’t wait for it to happen.

And I’m like that with everything.  If I get a new order I want to be able to do it right now and get it taken care of.  You don’t know how many times I have bought a new pair of shoes and worn them out of the store.  I always wear new clothes the next day.  When I was having babies I wanted to be pregnant the minute I made up my mind that I wanted a baby.  And when I got pregnant I wanted the baby delivered right then and there.  When I go to the grocery I want to eat everything I bought that day.  That’s why it’s better for me to shop for groceries every day.  If I go on a diet I want the weight to fall off today.  If I go on a trip I want to be at my destination right then and there.  Oh, it’s tiring even thinking about all of this.

My daddy used to say that I was wishing my life away.  I couldn’t wait to be a teenager.  Then I couldn’t wait to get into my twenties.  I think I quit that after my 30th birthday.  I didn’t mind being 30, I didn’t want to be thirty-something.  And I never wanted to be 40 or 50 or staring down 60.  So, I didn’t wish my life away.  I just wished away the first 30 years.  The second 30 years I have been screaming and cussing to slow down.

One of the bad things about not being patient is that you miss the process.  You miss the journey.  When I made up my mind I wanted to get married, I didn’t wait for the romance.  I didn’t wait for my love interest to catch up to me.  I called their hand.  But wouldn’t it have been cool if I had waited for them?  Wouldn’t it have been romantic if I had not known when they were going to propose?  But I wanted it right now.  I wanted to get married and have babies and I wanted my new life to start today.  I’m sure I was pretty miserable to be around until I got my way.

It’s been sort of that way with my writing.  Why haven’t I written a best seller?  I’m sorry I don’t have time to finish this because I need to get over here and write my best-seller.  What does my best seller even look like?  Woe is me, I have to get this done.

Okay, stop.  Okay.  We get it.  We get the fact that I am not patient.  We’re tired of the conversation.  Why don’t you finish the quote?  It’s actually a poem by Henry Van Dyke.  The whole poem is

“Time is too slow for those who wait,
Too swift for those who fear,
Too long for those who grieve,
Too short for those who rejoice;
But for those who love, Time is not.”

I discovered this poem while I was in college.  I had it printed for my mother, after the death of my father.  I really thought it captured what was going on in her life at the time.  And through the years it has captured what has gone on in my life.

Time is too slow for my impatience.  There have been times in my life I have been afraid of aging, of getting older.  Thankfully I’m not anymore.  But grief takes a lot out of you, for years.  You never get over grief.  You might try to bury it but it comes back to you again and again.  Time is too short for the good things.  We want those to go on and on and on.  But they don’t.  They end all too soon.  But then for love, time is not too slow or too swift or too long or too short.  Time is eternity with love.  This I believe.

Gotta love poetry, huh?  I’m glad this one was short.