A Waste of Time

So I’m not gonna lie, since Miles and Bianca went away to college, I’ve had some time on my hands. This probably sounds awesome to those of you who are still in the throes of potty training or dealing with spelling tests and Kraft Mac N’ Cheese and Girl Scout cookie sales and trying to get your kids in bed before prime time. But the God’s honest truth is that when your kids move out you are going to miss them like salt on the rim of your margarita. Unless you don’t go for a salted rim. Don’t get me wrong, I love only doing one load of laundry a day instead of three, and not spending $500 a week on groceries, and how every time I walk past their rooms the beds are made and they’re neat and clean and I don’t have to pick up their socks or dirty underwear, or deal with the eye-rolling, moody-teenage bad attitude…wait, what was I saying? OH, right, I miss my kids.

Nonetheless, I do find myself with a bit more free time, and as nobody has responded to my ad to write their kids’ term papers and college essays, I am learning to waste time in all sorts of creative ways. I know what you’re thinking: “D.Parker, you already waste so much time writing this blog!” And while this is true, it doesn’t take up as much time as you think.

Many women in my position might embrace this new freedom as a chance to reread some classics, take up needlepoint, join a tennis league…others perhaps less selfishly would look to volunteer work, spend more time with elder family members, help care for a niece or nephew…others still may consider, perish the thought, getting a job. And to all of them I say, why the hell would you want to do that?

My father is a Master at wasting time, so I have learned from the best. The man can spend a week pruning a bush or organizing a couple of files, an hour eating a carrot and another hour asking you a question. That’s right, asking. When I need to ask him a question I block out an entire morning and have an emergency exit strategy in place. Well, I used to, before I had so much free time. And as every generation hopes to see their children surpass them, I know my father must be proud of the new ways I have found to waste time. Watching tv, for instance, is a no brainer. Especially at this time of year with so many new shows, and so many good old shows coming back from haitus, and the BEST INVENTION KNOWN TO MODERN MAN, the DVR! When I want to kill a huge chunk of time in the middle of the day I just put on a movie! If the movie sucks, or I’m a little tired from doing so much nothing, I might even take a nap. Not to worry, I never oversleep, it’s just not possible.

You’d also probably be surprised how many hours you can waste playing “Words With Friends,” which, if you are not familiar, is a rip off of Scrabble that you can play over your cell phone or ipad. If you are lucky enough, like me, to find a friend who is a true rival in the wasting time department, you can literally waste whole days playing. Of course you can waste a fair amount of time playing with someone who has an actual job, but you end up wasting more time waiting for them to take their turn than taking your turn. But with wasting time being the true objective, it’s a win-win!

In honing in on these great ways to waste my time, what has become abundantly clear, are the many ways I do not want to waste my time. Working out at the gym, for example. I despise working out, and no matter how much time I ever had, I would still keep my workouts as short as possible! I mean I wouldn’t want to eat more and more tofu just because it was in front of me, and that pretty much sums up my feelings about spending time in the gym. And tofu. Which I find disgusting.

I also don’t want to waste time at the eye doctor. And that’s a shame because visiting my eye doctor can take up an entire day. Don’t get me wrong, love that woman at the check-in desk, she’s so nice, like when I brought Bianca in and she went on and on about how BEAUTIFUL she is, just GORGEOUS, really, so STUNNING…and I’m saying thank you, and it’s getting a bit embarrassing because she is just going on and on, so over the top, and then she looks at me and says, “She must look like her father.”

Anyway, they have the tv set to CNN which I can never get enough of, and I love, love, love the magazine selection, especially “The Outdoorsman” and “American Rifle.” All so entertaining that I hardly notice the hour that passes before I’m taken into an exam room. The part I hate begins after they put the dilating drops in my eyes and send me to the “lounge.” This is where the magic happens. I’m supposed to be waiting only 20 minutes for the dilation to occur, but I can be back there for hours, literally. Those enjoyable periodicals are useless when you can’t focus on anything, ditto the tv, and the fancy coffee machine that pours what is probably a delicious latte all over your sleeve because you can’t see where to hold the cup. Last year the nurse completely forgot about me and my doctor left for lunch before I crawled my way along the wall back to the front desk to ask what the hell was going on.

Well reader, I could go on about how I don’t want to waste time at the mandatory, three-hour church lectures for parents of confirmation candidates, for which I need toothpicks to keep my eyes open, and offends me in more ways than I can list; or that I’d much prefer to waste time teaching myself to become a mixologist, or learning how to give myself a manicure, but I’ve done it again: wasted a good chunk of time, and yours, with this blog.

Besides, it’s my turn again on “Words.”