The Days Are Long But the Years Are Short

Reflections on the cruel absurdity of middle age

“How you doing?” Tri-Star Pictures

Today we’re going to depart from our usually-scheduled nonsense about Star Wars or impressively in-depth Point Break theories—which are impressive primarily due to the depth and breadth I squeeze out of a surfer-bro movie; btw did you know I’m writing a book about Point Break?—and instead we’re just going to talk about life, man, and what it all means.

You may have realized last Friday passed without a digital high five from yours truly. Don’t feel bad if that realization is only now dawning on you, thanks to this assist—I’m busy, too. That’s sort of the problem.

I have been thinking lately about a comic strip I saw over 30 years ago. In truth, I've never really stopped thinking about it.

It was a standard three-panel, black & white comic strip. The first panel shows a boy playing with a kite or a pogo stick or something equally whimsical. The middle one depicts a frazzled-looking man who looks like he’s going to cry or scream, or both. The last panel is an old man, sitting on a park bench and leaning on a cane for good measure, because he’s effing tired.

I’ll be totally honest—I’m not 100% sure it actually was a comic strip. That’s how I remember it, but my memory is not what you’d call infallible. This sort of thing typically didn’t show up between Peanuts and Garfield.

Each panel was accompanied by text:

• Boy: has time & energy, but is dead broke

• Man: has energy & money, but his only personal time involves a toilet

• Geezer: has time & money, but somebody pass the oxygen

The lesson, or message, should be pretty self-evident. Nobody (outside of the privileged 1%) has everything. Life is a series of trade-offs, many of which you don’t even realize you’re making. Or are being made for you.

I like to tell my wife, “your time or your money,” when we’re making decisions. I’d heard the saying years ago and hastily co-opted it as my own personal motto because it reinforced my inherent belief that my time was important.

I’m not the handiest guy but I can fix plenty of stuff around the house. I’d still rather pay someone than spend an entire weekend on a project. That clearly comes from a place of privilege—I can afford to pay someone, and still get my eat on—but also from an inherent indifference to the way things are usually done—men are supposed to want to dick around with tools—and also probably a bit of laziness. Which is to say, my Gen X bonafides are older codes but they still check out.

There are few home improvement projects that I’ve gone into thinking, “man, this is going to go sideways several times, consume all my free time, and break my soul over its knee.” But that’s how it goes sometimes. My brother sent me this meme a few years ago and I felt that shit in my soul.

I’ve been this guy. I know that vacant, thousand-yard stare. The slumped shoulders, the naked dejection, the self-recrimination. There’s a famous Bible verse about the valley of the shadow of death and I’m pretty sure this is what it was talking about. The complete and utter decimation of the psyche. Times when praying is about the only thing you can do.

I didn’t intend on writing about the soul-crushing nature of home improvement. And don’t misconstrue my tone—I actually like fixing stuff around the house. Or, rather, I like having fixed things around the house. Sometimes the actual fixing is a real mother.

Lately I have the sense my life is slipping through my fingers. Is this what a mid-life crisis is like? I don’t feel the need to make any drastic changes. No convertibles or new girlfriends. I’m just desperately trying to hold on. To slow down. Some days I look back and think, “what the hell did I do today?” The workdays are forgettable. Unremarkable. They’re dissected neatly into 30 to 60 minute blocks, parceled out to people and projects I don’t care about, and carted away, gone before I realize what’s happened. The days melt one into another, coalescing into a shapeless mass with labels like month or year that I have no real recollection of.

In light of the maxim, “how you spend your days is how your spend your life,” this temporal fugue state is terrifying.

It’s now June. The year is nearly halfway over. I’m definitely not halfway to realizing the ambitions I had for 2023. Not even close.

I once thought—foolishly, optimistically—that once my kids no longer demanded constant attention, life would slow down. But the opposite has happened. My kids are pretty much living their own lives but I somehow have less free time now than when they were toddlers. I don’t understand it. There’s always something that needs doing. It’s unending. Was it always like this? Will it always be this way?

I have become the frustrated man in the middle panel of the comic strip. I’m wistful for the unending, unencumbered free time I had as a teenager. I look forward to retirement, even though that’s a devil’s bargain. I console myself with plans to retire early, to have my cake while I still have teeth and an appetite, but any such plans are uncertain at best. In this economy, and all that.

Yoda—all roads lead back to Star Wars, always—once busted Luke’s balls for daydreaming instead of focusing on what he was doing. We’re fully on Yoda’s side. Luke is 70% doofus, 10% airhead, 5% too short for a Stormtrooper, 15% hero. He definitely needed a “come to space Jesus” moment. But maybe Luke had simply become conditioned to daydreaming as a defense mechanism. Working for his uncle involved unending days of monotony. I don’t know exactly what is entailed in moisture farming—as in, the act of drawing water out of the air on a freaking desert planet—but it sounds hella tedious to me. There’s nothing to grow, nothing to weed, just a lot of sitting around, waiting for a cup to fill with water.

Yoda, not being impressed with Luke’s whole deal. Lucasfilm

My cup has run dry.

The weekdays are grueling. It’s usually 8 PM before everything that must be done is done and I can think about how I’d like to spend the few sweet hours before bed. I always tell myself I’ll write during this time, and I anticipate this window all day. But when it arrives, I’m tapped out. I’ve got nothing left.

Few things are more frustrating than desperately wanting to write but not being able to. It’s not writer’s block. I’ve had that. Writer’s block is a noxious blend of procrastination, fear, and doubt. Writer’s block is conquered by just getting started. Approaching the page with confidence and yet finding yourself empty of gumption and bereft of words is a different thing entirely. It’s the dawning recognition that you are not in control of your own life.

Middle age is a wasteland of trade-offs and bargains that are necessitated by the dwindling time available for the things you actually want to do. Middle age frequently sucks, but I guess it beats being old.