The Busier the Bee the Less Time to Be
What addicts Americans to activity?
Busy is an American accolade. Folks boast they’re “busy as can be,” even when they’re not. A full calendar is taken for a full life.
To my thinking this is backward. I hate being busy. Busy is the opposite of thoughtful, tranquil, wise. Busy dooms me to superficies, vacuities, howdies, glimpses. Busy means less musing, music, sleep, laughter, love. When I’ve a lot to do, I’m not doing what I believe I ought. Busy decries prayer, polysyllables, God.
Busy is the crippler of contentment, not its cause. It scrambles us and keeps us off kilter. We’re too busy to remember scenes we’ve seen and feelings we’ve felt. A little adrenaline is plenty; more is poison.
What addicts Americans to activity? The question’s worth pondering (if you have a moment). Why should we be avid for what breeds anxiety, futility, despair? Why are we so incompetent at keeping calm?
Capitalism is a leading culprit. Ours is a consumer culture. Bullish “consumer confidence” causes us to do more, buy more, so profits rise. When confidence declines, we spend less, the economy slumps. Musing, praying, loving we’re not spending. Ubiquitous and mighty engines of persuasion goad us to keep busy. As a boy, whenever I was still, my ever-so-busy mother checked my forehead for fever: “Are you sick?”
Dread of silence stirs distaste for it. How will we be judged by the hush? Are we glad how we’re spending our earthly chance? Silence is a stern inquisitor. Busy, who has time to think? Remorse, like love, takes time.
Rushing we lose the savor of our moment. It’s like viewing landscapes from a bullet train. Yes, we passed through those places, but what did we see, what do we remember? Stravinsky said you shouldn’t judge music until you’ve heard it at least five times. Listening to the same music, you wouldn’t be gobbling new – Heaven forbid!
Instant and rampant communications corrode concentration and calm. Opening my laptop I panic like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, bailing and bailing not to drown, beset as if by beggars in an impoverished country: everybody wants a piece of me, won’t take a minute, this cause is crucial, on this initiative mankind’s fate depends! These bleeders and pleaders are often right – I agree with them – but now I’m out of time and a nervous wreck!
Global competition makes idling irresponsible. No free time in this worldwide free-for-all – snooze and you lose! No honor to the sage thinking thoughts – what’s the good of thoughts, it’s doing that gets you where you want to go!
Many recognize their breathlessness, but treadmills can be dangerous to dismount. Both the demands of my job and pride kept me busy most of my years. Sundays and the wee hours were my only time to muse – and my indulgence shamed me, as if contemplation were dereliction. Poor pathetic me, I wrote poems! (Poetry and nuance are erased by the roar.)
The toll of incessant activity isn’t easy to assess. Well-meaning parents crowd their kids’ schedules with more and more so they do not “miss out” or “fall behind.” How can less be more?
My essential core was formed by solitude and silence. On this core my sanity and occasional serenity rely. In long hours alone with my dog I learned to dream, invent, make sense of the nonsense of my days. Obedient, I did my duty, satisfied expectations, was “a good boy,” but I knew in my heart that “good” wasn’t good. When Thoreau arrived in my life to assure me I was not a freak, I wept on his shoulder I was so grateful.