Waiting for something

Everyone is waiting for something. Waiting for the kettle to boil, the rain to stop, the sun to come out.

Everyone is waiting to clear their closets, their broken memories, their heads full of cynicism, the nagging fear that time is running out and it’s only just begun. Everyone is waiting for something and we’re not sure what it is. We are waiting for time to pass. The sun to set. We are waiting for another day, for a chance, a break, a letter, a message, an email. For the lucky numbers flattering birthdays and anniversaries to strike gold in the lottery.

In ‘Waiting for Godot,’ Vladimir and Estragon spend their entire time talking about and trying to meet the illusive Godot. It becomes clear that he will never show up and they are wasting their breath talking for the sake of talking and doing nothing because there is nothing they can do. Samuel Beckett’s existentialist play makes the audience think about the meaning of life, the absurdity of existence, the drudgery of passing time and the suffering it entails. Beckett reminds us of us.

What are we waiting for? We are waiting for something to modify, to heal, to resolve, to change course, to transmogrify, to change history. It is said that the only permanence is change, thus change is the only permanence. What are we waiting for? We are waiting for the lights to change, the weather to change, your children to call. You wait and wait. You get used to waiting. But when your time comes, you must not miss it.

Everyone is waiting for something and while we wait, we mislay the sense of the present, our own presence, of being there or here or somewhere or somewhere else.

Waiting for Something Good

Good things come to those who wait. They say. Waiting carves lines on your brow and irritates the nerves in your spine. Stress grows like magma in a volcano. Hunter gatherers lived with uncertainty. We have lost their gift of insouciance.

Waiting is a cycle of time when you have no control over the outcome of when the waiting will come to an end. It is a disease without a cure and the answer isn’t how to stop having that feeling of waiting, but what we do in the meantime. A wiseman – maybe it was a wise woman – once said while we wait, we must create. What are we waiting for? We are waiting for the war to end. The famine to end. The drought to end. The injustice to end. Waiting is like rust. It never sleeps. It never rests. While we wait for life, life passes, wrote Seneca, the Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome. Put simply, don’t wait.