Toujours Du Jour

Time used to be measured in days. Aside from the ubiquitous soup du jour, we had the Thought for the Day and the Word of the Day. Everyone who ever lived with a parent, at some point in their lives, has shouted about The Way It’s Done Today – presumably in response to the way “it” was done in previous days.

After that, time was measured by the hour. Remember the Man of the Hour? Well, he died of old age. Now it’s by the minute. Thank you, technology.

Back in the 80s, when everyone else was searching for excellence or learning to love themselves, I read a lot of Zen. I tried to get on top of the idea of living in the moment. Back then, time was still measured in hours instead of minutes, so living in the moment was a relatively novel idea. I never did it. I was always thinking about what had already happened, what might happen shortly, or what could happen eventually.

Fast forward to this morning. I was in the gym (where else?) on the elliptical. I had no book, and I never use headphones. The guy next to me had TV and a video phone and headphones. He lasted about ten minutes. I was on a 45 minute cycle, with nothing to do but think. My time passed as comfortably as time can pass while you’re doing cardio.

Wax on, wax off. Watching the clock tick down, minute after slow minute, while I pushed forward at a steady pace, after all those years and all that Zen, I was finally living in the moment. The next step is to learn to take life one day at a time.