Instead

Whenever I sit down to write to you, I can’t help but think about what I ought to be doing instead.

The good news is that the older I get, the shorter that particular list gets. I no longer feel that saving the world is an option. Yes, there was a time when I did. It wasn’t recent and I might have been a little tipsy. I was inclined to lift the elbow in those days. There may be a connection.

Now the list is more pedestrian. There’s a plot that’s giving me trouble, I can put the story together but not in an interesting and funny way, and it has to be both. There’s always laundry. Believe it or not, I still write paper letters and mail them in envelopes with stamps. Not many, though, and I’m good for this week. I’m writing to you instead.

It’s your turn. What should you be doing instead of reading this? The big things can be put off. That project you’re working on can’t be done in an hour, an afternoon or an evening. The little things aren’t important. You can procrastinate until they don’t need to be done anymore. Everything else you’ve probably already done or you’d be doing it now. Just like me.

So here we both are, instead. It’s a pity I don’t drink anymore, this calls for one.