Maniverse #5 – Time In A Bottle

Do you remember the song time in a bottle by Jim Croce? Yes I know that the song is a bit old and dated but the lyrics seemed a it meaningful to me as I was driving yesterday. For those of you that don’t remember the words…I suggest you read them below!

If I could save time in a bottle
The first thing that Id like to do
Is to save every day
Till eternity passes away
Just to spend them with you

If I could make days last forever
If words could make wishes come true
Id save every day like a treasure and then,
Again, I would spend them with you

But there never seems to be enough time
To do the things you want to do
Once you find them
Ive looked around enough to know
That you’re the one I want to go
Through time with

If I had a box just for wishes
And dreams that had never come true
The box would be empty
Except for the memory
Of how they were answered by you

But there never seems to be enough time
To do the things you want to do
Once you find them
Ive looked around enough to know
That you’re the one I want to go
Through time with

Let me give you some context to my thoughts. I was driving to an all day meeting in Madison, WI which is about a 2.5 hour drive and on the way home (another 2.5 hours) I started truly thinking about the amount of time away from our families we as full time working dads have sacrificed. Now I am not saying that Moms do not sacrifice this time as I know they do…so hear me out.

I started to think about all of the times where I was driving long distances for meetings and how quickly this time adds up into much larger amounts of time. I can remember my first professional job where I was driving about 2 hours each day. I stayed in this job for about 1.5 years. Thinking back on this for a year’s worth work (in this case 9 months) I spent approximately 360 hours of my life on the road. Now I occupied my time listening to audio books and the like, but still 360 hours. Those are360 hours that I can never get back to depend with J-Mom. The time now that I spend going to meetings is time I can never get back with Diva-J & Diva-PJ.

Outside of my own experiences, I think about those people who drive for a living, such as truck drivers. Now I know that some of them have their wives or families riding with them, but many of them ride alone, and I wonder what kind of life that is, especially if they have families. I don’t think that I could do that myself (needless to say I wouldn’t be able to stay awake for the amount of time that I would need without copious amounts of caffeine).

So the moral of this story…take advantage of the time that you have as it is fleeting and precious…don’t squander it!