Time is a nuisance: on time warps and stress

Time is a nuisance on Sundays.  On a day when we are told to take our time, we obsess over the clock, check how much more time off we have, focus more on using our time off than actually relaxing into that time.  In those moments when we actually flow into an event and use up a good chunk of time – a movie, brunch with friends, a good book – we finish that event regretting the time we wasted whether we enjoyed the time warp or not.  In fact, we would probably do almost anything to get that time back, rationalizing that we could have read that book on the subway and the Eggs Benedict was overpriced anyway.

And then there are the things we always tell ourselves we’ll get to when we have time off like this.  Unwatched documentaries, books unread, games to finish: they taunt us on the last day of a holiday like the half-eaten turkey drying out in the fridge.  Some of us finished those things, and we regret not having something new to look forward to, so we immediately go and buy something for the next moment we need to time warp.  Others didn’t get to them at all, instead choosing to do even less productive things like drink with friends or watch marathons of television — and then we judge ourselves for choosing such a dark path.  Still others spend the time traveling and come home even more tense than we left, returning to work in desperate need of more free time.

Or we come up with things on which we need to “catch up.”  Best of the lot: catching up on sleep.  So we literally time warp, sleeping away the time off, slipping into a deep laziness that feels both delicious and scandalous, like some secret we dare not discuss on Monday.

Stressing about relaxing is a chore.  ”Gotta go get some rest.”