Father Time is a weekly column dedicated to the concept of time in a parent’s life, particularly a father’s life. The point of view comes from a father of two young sons, both under three-years-old, and how time really is just that: a concept.
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In Kurt Vonnegut’s first novel, Player Piano, Dr. Paul Proteus struggles to live his dream of living off the land in a world where machines have taken over almost all the viable jobs.
If anyone has been in this particular spot—juggling a job and a passion at the same time—you know that you build your life, or at least try to, around getting back to that passion as soon, and for as long as, possible.
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In a pivotal conversation with Ed Finnerty, another character, Paul says, fully realizing his own distress, “Don’t put one foot in your job and the other in your dream… Go ahead and quit, or resign yourself to this life. It’s just too much of a temptation for fate to split you right up the middle before you’ve made up your mind which way to go.”
As a full-time sales representative and an aspiring writer, never has a line of text wrecked me so bad. I read the book many years ago, and it’s stuck with me since. As much as I try to deny it, there’s a painful reality when I get home after a long day on the road, and I think about writing a few lines or editing a few pages: I just can’t do it. I don’t have the mental or physical energy.
If anyone has been in this particular spot—juggling a job and a passion at the same time—you know that you build your life, or at least try to, around getting back to that passion as soon, and for as long as, possible. You might find a morning to yourself here, or an hour after you’ve put the kids to bed there. Sometimes you might not find any time at all. A hard day’s work will do that to you. Other times, a few weeks go by and you haven’t added to that thing you’re building. There it sits, another day, waiting for you, and there you go setting it aside, but getting at least a tiny jolt of joy from the mere thought of working on it.
It’s in those moments when you, when we, consider quitting our day jobs. What if we just burned the boats in order to force us to stay on the island of our dreams? The scariest thing about this, is that we just might do it. I had told myself that I would hang up the traveling salesman life when I turned 40. That birthday is less than a year away, and I can feel my passion clock ticking. I could easily quit it all, but where would my family be? A husband and father can’t simply quit without a solid exit strategy. Not in this day and age.
No time is wasted. Not even for farting around. Remember that.
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And so, what’s a guy to do? Keep working. Whether it’s on the thing you love, or the thing that pays your bills, or even formulating that exit strategy, just keep doing it all. Don’t stop. All the time you spend on any of it is worth it. Every minute of it is learning,and preparation for the next thing.
Though Player Piano is a tragicomic view of what we can become if we don’t live our dreams, my view is that we have to keep the machine moving regardless, while trying not to complain too much about it. We have to work on something. We are, after all, on this earth for one reason, according to Vonnegut: Farting around. No time is wasted. Even if it feels like farting around. Remember that.
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Photo credit: Robert Couse-Baker.