I am mad and unsatisfied with my time expenditure. I want to blame you, but that’s no way to take accountability.
Yesterday, I found myself fixated on a fly stuck between the inside of the screen and my bedroom window. “You will die here,” I thought, knowing its fate with 100% accuracy. It’s a burden you cannot fully understand until you bear it. I opened the window, pulled the screen’s black tab until a gap formed, and then ushered the little fellow out with a gift bag and a pat on its bottom using the side of my cell phone as a guide.
Later, while soaking in the bath, I heard the bass-throaty buzz of another large house fly. Its situation was similar, and knowing its death was certain made me mad. How dare it ruin my perfectly good bathtime with its black void future. Unlike the other window, the taut, narrow screen disallowed me from chauffeuring it into the almost-summer air. Never to see summer, I thought. Who cares? Let it die!
But that weight—knowing the fate of another creature—bears upon you heavily, and until you experience it, you’ll never know.
I tolerated a five-minute bathtime filled with fly-regret thoughts before springing up naked and dripping across the floor. In a cabinet, I searched for a container. My old Q-tip holder fit the bill. I slid the window back and forth, beckoning the fly out of the area by that fuzzy black strip and into the open. Thankfully, it was slow and wanted to be caught, so no more energy was needed besides a walk downstairs to set it free. I watched it whizz away out of the front door and into the air, hoping it was early into its 28-day lifespan and would find a safe spot to bunk down for the night.
Twenty-eight days. What a flash. I can barely finish a movie in a month, and that guy is guaranteed to be born and die in that time.
Reflecting on time and how I use it, I focus on comedy. Why do I want to be funnier, you ask? Because funny is cool. Funny is inviting, intoxicating, and lovely. I’m funny in counseling sessions. Often, the heaviness of topics like disappointment and shame in oneself or one’s choices is enough. So, when I make a joke about if they knew the circus was in town and it being intense, we can all groan and roll our eyes that it should have, in fact, been in tents.
But, like I said, I’m sick of sharing my time. With flies, with Evelyn, with dumb things I don’t want to do. But where’s the line between dumb things I don’t want to do and everything turning into a dumb thing I don’t want to do? Because I’m starting to notice when I get time, I’m looking for something to do with it and then feel like I don’t have time to do anything anyway.
On a completely different topic, I performed a blatant, bold-faced lie today. And you know what? I don’t feel the eensiest bit of guilt. It actually felt quite good. And since I tell the truth 99.9% of the time, they didn’t even suspect it. Which felt even better! I am so honest a lie doesn’t make a blip on their radar!
This reminds me of a Jungian Society event I attended with my friend Reid. A members-only $5 discount at the ticket counter inspired me to say I was a member. After asking and searching for my name, I even stooped down to search the paper with her, saying, “Hm, that’s funny. I just signed up.”
However, not fun was during the show. Anytime the door opened for a person to enter or exit the venue, I felt tense and held my breath, anticipating the librarian-like lady with a clipboard would come with handcuffs to take me away.
A good ol’ blatant lie is like a colonoscopy. It cleans out the honesty pipes and reminds us we’re alive.
Note: No one was hurt in the telling of these lies.
Thank you.
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 