My dream, and the basis for some psychoanalyst’s new boat (if I was in analysis)
<dream>
A disembodied voice booms, "CONAN! WHAT IS BEST IN LIFE?"
<cut>
I’m walking to a minivan with my biological father.
Me: "Dad, do you know what’s most important?"
Dad: "I have plenty of money, a beautiful house and everyone loves me" he said emphatically.
Me: "Dad, but what’s most important?"
Dad: "I have a beautiful wife, and she adores me."
Me: "But do you know what is most precious?"
Dad: "….."
Me: "Time, TIME, you’ve got no fucking time." And by this I meant both free time and time left, since he’s pretty old.
</dream>
That’s a weird dream. The opening is clearly because I’ve been reading comic author Warren Ellis’ blog a lot, and many of his posts about extreme body modification start with "Conan! What is best in life?!"
What’s weird though is that my own sense of time has shifted quite a bit. I’m experiencing a tremendous crunch of work right now, and wasn’t really getting in the at least 8 hours a day I needed to hold up my end of the circus tent. So I started going to bed at 9 or 9:30pm so I could wake up early. I do, and scoot out the door and am working by 6 or 6:30am. Since my brain just about shuts down at 4pm anyway regardless of when I start work, this gives me 10 good hours of work given the fact that I usually eat lunch at my desk.
The experience is weird, but I have the luxury of being able to go home and not have to try and work with Moishe bouncing around the house. I can just be a parent and a husband, instead of being that dad that comes home and goes upstairs to work, or tries to work on a laptop in the living room with everyone else around. I’ve tried that, it doesn’t work well at all.