Voids in the Fabric of Time

I have just come to the realization that an airport is possibly the best place for one to start writing a blog post. If you’re disconnected from the Internet and travelling alone, you’re free of all distractions. An interesting observation here-Gmail and FaceBook- Two websites that have the amazing ability to engage you in totally worthless net activity, leaving you to wonder where those precious hours of your life had disappeared…Spoof! Into thin air. Our life is filled with such voids, spaces of time about which one seems to recall almost nothing. It was Umberto Eco, I think, who said that it was through the filling of these voids that he achieved success in so many diverse fields, a feat which seemed fantastic to his peers.

These voids seem like completely useless chunks of time that have been spent in mindless pursuits. That hour you spent in the auto-rickshaw, at the dentist’s reception area or simply waiting (im)patiently for that dawdling friend of yours. You feel that if they were removed from your past, it would make no difference to the present you. That you could have given them to someone who you knew treasured each and every moment spent with you. Minutes that you could have used to make a phone call and made someone feel remembered and cared for. That you could have spent trying to cheer someone up and felt the warm feeling spread through your veins and the goose-bumps rising on your arms—all at the sight of the smile the eyes were hungry for. So many could haves…

So why do we have these “voids” in our life? Do they serve a purpose? Or is it just me? Why is there a part of my life which is being squandered away right in front of my eyes? Why do I always say I am busy and then realize that there is nothing to show for it? Why can I not spend a couple of hours chatting with my friends without feeling guilty about not studying for the insignificant little quiz day after tomorrow? Why can’t I be free and revel in Dolce far niente (the sweetness of doing nothing); without feeling like precious moments of my life are slipping away…forever.

Sighhh… too many questions and no answers. How I wish I could be the kind of person who is omnipresent- who always looks carefree and yet manages his own work perfectly well. He would have a hundred things pending, but always be there for you when you need him the most. I believe it is like that story of the tennis balls and sand- you have to fill in what seems most important to you in the glass jar first - the tennis balls. And everything else, just like sand slithers in, and makes a place for itself in the glass jar of time. If only you knew what it  is that is the most important…