If you’re a fan of the cult classic movie, “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” and you began reading this column because you thought I was writing about it, let me clear things up right now.
I’m not writing about “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.”
(I will admit to having seen the movie many, many times at midnight during my high school years when they showed it at the long-since-gone Golden Ring Mall movies. I would then spend the next few days picking rice out of my hair, which has always been this thick. Literally, days…)
The topic this week, instead, is about how time flies.
And not just when you’re having fun.
Or when you’re busy.
Or even when you’re on vacation.
What I’ve noticed is how time flies as soon as you’re an adult.
I wish I could go back to the kid I once was and tell her to enjoy her summers. And her school years for that matter. Because while I was telling everyone, “Guess what? I’m 7-and-a-half,” I was wanting my life to go faster.
I couldn’t wait to become an adult. I wanted to be an 8th grader. Then a high school senior. Then in college.
Then I became an adult. And right now, I have absolutely no idea where this past summer went.
Really. It’s like we become adults and get sucked into a portal in which all time goes really super-fast.
Your kid is starting kindergarten, and you practically blink your eyes, and he or she is heading into senior year of high school.
What? Can someone please tell me what just happened?
I was watching an episode of “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” recently (which I had recorded on the DVR because God knows, I’m not awake that late on a weeknight…or a weekend night, for that matter), and The Roots had a musical guest playing with them.
It was Tom Bailey. If you don’t recognize his name, he was the red-haired guy from the 1980s group The Thompson Twins.
I looked him up on the internet because I wanted to see if he was touring. He is.
That was the good news.
Then I happened to look at an article that listed his age.
He’s 60.
Clunk…
Sorry, I fainted there for a moment. Let me fan myself and get it together.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that 60 is old.
What I am saying is that…well, what in the world happened?!
How are his biggest hit songs now at least 30 years old?
And when kids are starting back to school this week, how am I not?
Going to school, I mean…
Where did the time go?
As kids, we keep track of time in a few ways—by our ages (including quarters, halves, three quarters), the grades we’re in, and school breaks.
As adults, well, we usually keep track of time like this: “How in the world is almost Labor Day weekend?” “I haven’t even gotten all the summer clothes out of the attic!” and “The stores have Christmas stuff out already? Are you kidding me?!”
None of us are saying, “Hey, guess what? I’m 45 and a half!”
Nope. We’re saying things like, “Hey, did you know that 40 is the new 30?”
I read an article that stated the reason time seems to go slowly for kids is because they are being exposed to new stimuli all the time, every day. As adults, we’re not.
I beg to differ.
As adults, seems like there’s a new social media platform every couple of months. Or new technology that we have to master for our jobs. Or tons of new cable stations featuring more shows than we can live long enough to see.
Hey, that reminded me of one way that time does slow down for us adults—you know when it goes the slowest?
When your favorite television show culminates in a spectacular season finale…and then you have to wait months, or even nearly a year, to see it again.
Speaking of that, when does “Mad Men” come back on?
Until then, at least a part of my life will drag.
Michele Wojciechowski, when she’s not waiting for the latest book to come out by one of her favorite authors (CAN’T YOU WRITE FASTER?!), writes “Wojo’s World®” from her home office.
Want to hear more about the World of Wojo in between columns? Sign up for her twice-monthly newsletter by emailing her at Wojo@WojosWorld.com. It’s full of laughs!