Reading Francis

“Leisure is not the privilege of those who have time, but rather the virtue of those who give to each instant of life the time it deserves.” – Br. David Steindl-Rast

“Take the big trip.” 

I was catching up with a good friend who said this, not as a directive, but as a descriptor of a moment she was going through with her circle. She rattled off several friends of hers who had either lost a spouse or been diagnosed with cancer at way too young an age, and captured the impact of that mini-trend as one of those “take the big trip” reminder moments. Because tomorrow is not promised. 

I have been in a “Take the big trip” moment lately, too. We are at the age, perhaps, when life hits this point hard. In our 50s, we still have kids on the payroll and a significant stretch of years until retirement, so time chugs along on the routine of a daily/monthly/yearly grind of banal normalcy. But, like it or not, we find out that we are old enough for our cohort to be handed a share of brutal diagnoses that is a lot larger than the rare and tragic losses we felt in our 20s and 30s. Where before, we might have been lulled into believing that tomorrow was at least a pretty safe bet, that illusion is wearing away now.

One of the sad-but-instructive lessons of working with a lot of retirees is that, earlier than many, I knew people who had learned the hard way that tomorrow is not promised. 

I especially remember a couple who volunteered with us as early retirees. That had not been their plan. They expected to have years, maybe decades, to travel the world once they retired, but the oncologists revealed a different future to them. They were wonderful people, great volunteers, and relentlessly upbeat, which in hindsight is really remarkable, because I would have been pissed. They had postponed so many of their dreams for a day that, as it turns out, not only had never been promised but would not ever come. That they moved forward with a sense of joy in a different direction than the one they wanted is a testament to their character and a sign of hope for the rest of us.

I was surprised by the people I knew who were nudged by the pandemic to retire earlier than they might have been planning. I sure don’t blame them, though, since the whole society was reckoning with the reality that tomorrow is not promised.

There are, I think, two idols that I struggle to let go of here. 

The first is maybe more obvious: the illusion that my future is somehow truly mine to map out and control. Despite the many lessons to the contrary, I still find myself thinking through “the plan” that writes an advance story on how the next four decades will roll out. Even during my “take the big trip” moments, I tend to respond like a slow quarterback who sees the defensive pressure coming; I may speed up my process a bit, but I keep working through my progression of decision points, rather than ditching the plan and scrambling to make the most of the moment. I do not need any more evidence that time is not mine to control, but that doesn’t keep me from forecasting my retirement security index. 

And that presumption, that in the end, I am in charge, is certainly a false god.

But there is another idol here, too. 

How do you spend the time you’re given? 

I don’t spend a lot of the time I’m given. I just waste it. How much of my day is oriented neither toward a worthwhile pursuit nor toward truly enjoying the moment I am in? How many hours aren’t in anyway connected to loving God or anyone else, myself included? The “screen time” report on my phone is an opening data point in the indictment. Even in the face of lives cut too short, I find myself wasting time, not in restorative, leisurely appreciation, but in the pretend busyness of our age. Scrolling to the end of a social media feed. Following every link of every emailed newsletter. Playing one more game of Sudoku. That I can both know how precious and unpromised life is and yet still squander it is a sure sign of desperate addiction.

Tomorrow is not promised. That this isn’t a new or profound revelation, and yet it remains unable to persuade me to “give to each instant of life the time it deserves,” speaks to the power of the idol.