They say that time goes by faster the older you get. Is this true or is it simply our perception that the more distant our memories become, the slower they went by when we were actually experiencing them? I seem to remember summer as a kid feeling like a long weekend.
Time always flies by faster the more fun we’re having, so are we having more fun as adults? Eh, it doesn’t feel like it.
Are the memories we are creating in the present time more fleeting because they represent a smaller percentage of a larger life span than that of a child, whose memories take up a much larger block of their life? I guess, but does it really matter? Apparently, the older you get it does.
I’m starting to feel that, regardless of perceptions or fractions, time goes by faster today, because the present time is moving at a much more rapid pace than it was 20, 30 or 40 years ago and beyond. Perhaps it’s the increase of distractions, claiming micro-units of our time while slowly fogging up the windows of our prefrontal cortex. That one is a given, but I believe inflation would also need to play some role as well, for how can we pay attention to our time when we’re too busy working it off, living to earn instead of earning to live?
Climbing Down
As our collective generations stumble forward together, there seems to be some miscommunication as to how things can continue to proceed under certain past standards and expectations. For instance, in the early 70’s my dad put himself through college washing dishes part time. After covering his room and board, books, tuition and fees, he still had pocket money to buy himself a sweet old pickup truck and some beer. It wasn’t easier and he worked his tail off, but financially speaking it was simpler.
When I went back to school for three years in 2013 I was taking an average of 7 college courses per semester while working 30-40 hour weeks and I barely had enough money to pay for rent and groceries (mind you this was in the booming front range of Colorado or New California). If I wanted to avoid going into student loan debt, then why didn’t I just buckle down and work harder?
Well because I would have had to clock in for about 140 hours per week just to cover my tuition, plus housing and I’m not sure that this ruthless, imaginary employer would have been flexible enough to work around my exam schedule, given their high demand for so much of my time and highly developed, hypothetical skill set.
From purchasing houses and cars, to debt-consolidation and medical expenses, the weight of economic inflation is becoming too heavy for many of us to just shrug off by picking up a couple of evening shifts here and there. Even if we land that job promotion, our need to live a bigger life leads us right back to digging ourselves out of a hole that keeps getting deeper. Actually, I’m not sure why the phrase, “dig yourself out of a hole” exists; because when someone “digs themselves a hole” that explicitly means they are getting deeper, so one would need to conduct the antithesis of digging in order to escape the hole they are in, like climbing or jumping. Unfortunately, jumping out of debt only happens when a lottery is won or a wealthy Aunt dies.
Debt I Do That?
While arthritis and dementia may steadily continue their assault on us as we age, the real “ailment” to watch out for is debt. Avoid debt as much as possible. It’s as ugly as anything we will encounter in our lives and even wields the ability to outlive us. It will not only follow us into old age, it will disgracefully reveal itself to our grieving loved ones, who are then assigned the responsibility of our “estate”, as they figure out how to pay for the college that we have posthumously attended.
“…and to my youngest grandson, I bequeath to you my second year at Cal State Tech – did I really go to that school? I can’t even remember going to any of my classes, haha…and to you, dearest little Betsy…you can pay for my parking tickets; there are a whole lot of them, but I don’t even remember owning a car…oh wait, my bad, it’s my unpaid Uber tab.”
At least some chunk of what contributes to the dissatisfaction of people in our culture has to do with the fact that they can no longer work reasonable hours to pay for things like housing, a mode of transportation, higher education or even food; most people have to borrow money for at least two of these things. Even if we start off our fiscally responsible (adult) lives with a clean slate, once we become aware of our personal value in terms of credit, all bets are off the table.
To make matters worse, the consumer culture in which we’re raising our kids in the last 20 years has made it nearly impossible for them to avoid the notion of borrowing money for just about anything that pops into their future heads. There are always some who may harshly criticize younger generations for being lazy or unmotivated, but I truly believe they’re just confused, because if time is money, then living on this borrowed time is unnatural. And taxing, regardless of how fast or slow it seems to go by.
If your old Paw-paw is one of these critics and claims that “times were simpler back in my day”, then that is something you both can agree on. Maybe younger generations can open up to our elders in this common ground and instead of saying “you just don’t get it”, let them know that it is a complicated world and that we, too, are just trying to keep up. After all, time is probably whizzing by them at this point and their well is getting full; or drying up, depending on how you look at it.
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