Baja Review A community newspaper serving Ensenada, Valle de Guadalupe, and Rosarito in Northern Baja California
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When I turned 21 my mother told me I would know I was grown up when I understood time. I don’t think I ever got it.
If I’m waiting for something, I prepare and prepare, and then the event comes and goes and I’m still preparing and maybe even still worrying. Not for too long, a few days and then it fades away. Usually. Sometimes it never goes away. I’m still waiting to see the end of a Hopalong Cassidy TV show I didn’t get to watch when I was 7, and to find a piece of fabric I had when I was 20.
If I’m shopping hard for something, like packing boxes before a move, I tend to keep looking for them long after I’ve moved and unpacked.
I don’t seem to have the approach, arrival, and “it’s all over” sequence down. My emotions don’t seem to be in sync with the facts. I panic early, and don’t know quite when to stop.
And getting places on time, a real struggle. I never know when to start getting ready, or exactly when to leave, so I tend to be late, and I’m always surprised to find it so.
I use a Franklin planner and that helps a lot. I have a dry erase calendar on the wall. I use the monthly calendar in my book and the daily pages to write down what I’m supposed to do and then what I did do. I wear a watch and check it constantly. It helps keep the facts of my life on the right page. When I’m going out for a day of errands, I type a list of stores, items and the times I should be at each place.
I do get my newspaper out on time. And I do pick up people from the airport on the right day. Mostly I get the bills paid on time (although I did let the registration lapse on both my cars last month). But I’m always a little afraid I won’t.
It hangs over my head, the fear that I’ll get it all wrong. Time, for me, is an amorphous, unpredictable cloud I float in and not a linear road with clear signs. Mostly time seems to be going off around me like small fire crackers, not passing in a proper, smooth, predictable flow.
I consider myself time impaired, and I’m thankful to live in Baja. Mexico is much more forgiving of such shortcomings than say, Oregon. People are kind and patient here and I love the phrase, “Tomorrow is another day.” In Spanish, and abbreviated it’s “Manana.”
