Just about every time, I choose quality. In hours of homework, number of meetings, length of meetings, number of streaming shows, calories, alcoholic beverages, excursions. As Faith Hill writes in “Don’t Let Love Take Over Your Life”:
More and more time isn’t necessarily better and better.
Hill writes of the love-life balance, mimicking the work-life balance, as a way to assess how we spend (and occupy) the waking hours.
I’ve noted how sleep is more disrupted now than 20 years ago; I’m undecided whether my sleep now is more erratic than it was 8 years ago with a toddler. In this phase, I can wake up feeling vivacious even if I’ve had as little as 5 hours or 7 hours of sleep, which took getting used to since I consistently slept 8-10 hours. But, my body has changed and my daily flow is different than it used to be.
These notions of love-life stir up the idea of the third space that a friend told me of 20 years ago. The magnetism of the third space is that it is a third leg to the day, that isn’t home or the workplace. The love-life balance or imbalance is curious because work would be a way to balance out the over-isolating that couples and spouses do, unless the couple works together. And, if both adults are working from home by way of the internet, even though their work, or industries, may be different, they are still in more physical proximity to each other than they are to other people. I suppose that the online work or schooling may mean that they are further away emotionally or intellectually. But, this is how these measures are curious and also messy.
I’ve noted for the last 3 years how adults have been stilted by social anxieties following the near two years of social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic. Whether the six foot obligations were mandatory at the post office or grocery store or enforced unevenly by law enforcement or not sanctioned as a policy at the state or municipal level, adults have been adjusting to new social behaviors and dynamics. In part, the pandemic gave more choice: whether to wear a mask, whether to shake hands or hugs when meeting someone. Even though curbside pickup is a rarity, trunk or treat is a variation for Halloween that isn’t going away. Part of the purpose of choice is being able to note: how much more of this person, place, thing, of experience do I want? what is the opportunity cost of spending the next hour or the weekend with this person?
I’m eager for more trusted surroundings, consistently practicing community as I haven’t forgotten the dire observations that Putnam wrote of in Bowling Alone 20 years ago. I sense that being less rigid, fearful, and skeptical of the people who we know to be true will assist us in being better together.
washing dishes: a father’s glimpses 