Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Making good use of Feb. 29

Just as I treasure the additional hour when we fall back into Standard Time, no matter how seriously it disorients me, I find the gift of an entire day something rare, to which I have never given any thought.  It is on a par with the skill of a superhero, conquests of space or time or gravity.    Here is the calendar saying, Oh, look what we've found for you.  Silly us, we'd put it aside for just such an occasion.   Go ahead, we want you to have it.

By now, this bonanza is nearly 9 1/2 hours gone and I'm only beginning to imagine how best to use it.  Like discovering the bank balance is higher than remembered, it is found time,  birthday money, a MacArthur genius grant.  I would describe my relationship with time as conflicted, had I not realized that accepting its liquid properties, and my weightless drifting thereupon,  almost allows us to be friends.  I am not as troubled by its unreliable ways as I once was, having first supposed that when I had less to do, there would be more of it.

During years of job, family, freelancing and life, I felt like a losing contestant on Beat the Clock.  The seconds ran out long before I chased the ping pong ball across the finish line, armed with cans of Redi-Whip as propellant.  Or something like that.  A day was too impossibly small to contain all that it was expected to hold.  Each morning I looked at the bed before sprinting out the door, wondering just how long it would be until I could sleep again.   I had no experience of time as mutable; I had no awareness of choices.

Leap Day feels like Ferris Bueller territory.  I wish I'd planned for it, paid better attention.  I'd have a list of frivolous must-dos to check off, squeezing the bonus good out of each second.  Now it is too late for anything other than improvisation, which may be the best response after all.  Divided into scheduled activities, it would have been just another day.  I think I'll start with reading and see where that takes me, the perfect seque to a guilt-free nap.  If only Starbucks delivered.

12 comments:

Robert the Skeptic said...

I fear I have already squandered my "extra"day already. No wait... I'm with friends. [whew]

Elisabeth said...

I would like to have honoured that extra day a bit more, too, Marylinn, and to have done something special or marked it in some way. But like it was for you, the dayslipped away before I could note its essential properties, a day like any other, nothing extra or special about it, apart from the date.

Erin in Morro Bay said...

I always love the 29th - every four years our birthday month is one day longer! I celebrate all month so it's always nice to have one more day. Let me know if you can get Starbuck's to deliver!
Erin

Kass said...

Found time is like a found treasure.

Penelope said...

Great idea, to spend 29ths out-of-the-ordinarily (takes note for 2016). I wonder where your read and nap took you . . . I headed for the hills that day, expecting to plot and plan, but it seemed to demand instead dreaming and gazing and poking the fire. I obliged.

Jayne said...

...Starbucks delivered. Ha! They ought to offer that service every February 29, Marylinn.

I can't remember what I did on the 29th. I guess that pretty much sums up the 29th as another ordinary day here in Cucumberland. However, I do remember rising and telling the kids - Oh joy, our extra day of winter! And snow was falling softly... Oh, it was a pretty special day after all!

Marylinn Kelly said...

Robert - Time with friends, as you clearly know, is never squandered. A splendid choice.

Marylinn Kelly said...

Elisabeth - I nearly missed the significance, again. My reading leaned more in the nap direction, I assume that was the indicated thing.

Marylinn Kelly said...

Erin - So far, no luck with the Starbuck's delivery. Our town is quite compact, we have four Starbucks' locations, one a mere block away. How hard could it be? I hope it was a grand month there, as it was here. xo

Marylinn Kelly said...

Kass - It is, reason to always carry something to read and to write upon.

Marylinn Kelly said...

Penelope - Dreaming and gazing and poking the fire. I think I'd already devoted some of the morning to two of those, as with most mornings. Napping took over and I can't complain.

Marylinn Kelly said...

Jayne - An extra day of your treasured winter, nothing lost about that, not if you took the time to notice. We could get that Starbuck's petition started...