The Perfect Time
By Imaodibo Empress
There is something fascinating about the way you wait for life to begin, insisting that it must be a proper beginning, of course.
Somehow, our brains have been wired to strike the first match in the new year. A new month. A Monday morning. A birthday. The beginning of a semester. Or, at the very least, 6:00 a.m. on a day when you have decided that things must finally change.
You want to get things done, but only at conventional beginnings. You want to begin at round figures, and it makes it so hard to believe that you can actually work round the clock because you have to wait till it’s 12:30 p.m. to start again.
Welcome to the world of classy procrastinators.
You are the person who decides to stop procrastinating only when the pendulum clock goes ding-dong. You will become disciplined in the year you turn 21, independent on the first of October, and a completely different person on the first of January. Somehow, the present moment never seems quite good enough.
You’re always waiting for the perfect time, but he is rather an elusive fellow. You travel to different calendar countries to find him because he promises you the best date each time. Well… that’s not a lie, but the food you’d eat with him won’t be enough to sustain you till you get to him again, in the next calendar country.
You have a peculiar affection for round figures. You would rather sleep for 30 more minutes than 26. You prefer 12:00 to 11:58, 7:00 to 6:57, and the first day of the month to the twenty-eighth.
The round letter must wish you loved her half as much, but she is frequently exchanged for E in “now” to get “new”—a new day, a new month, a new year, a new you. It’s the same reason you stand in one spot until it’s 7 on the dot. You have seen this obsession everywhere. Wedding invitations announce that the ceremony begins at 8:00 a.m. Birthday invitations settle for 9:30 a.m. And even when an event is scheduled for 9:45, you somehow feel that the organiser has failed to give you a sufficiently satisfying number.
The funny thing is that you have carried this fondness for conventional beginnings into your everyday routine. If you are one of the disciplined ones, your day may run like a well-rehearsed timetable: bathe at 6:00 a.m., cook at 9:30 a.m., and study at 12:00 noon. But why not bathe at 5:58 a.m., cook at 9:36 a.m., and begin studying at 11:59 a.m.? Would the water refuse to touch your skin? Would the food cook differently? Would your textbook suddenly become unreadable?
Of course not. Yet, somehow, the odd minute feels less inviting than the neat one. You are not necessarily waiting for the time to be right; you are waiting for it to look right.
Perfect Time is that friend who brings out the best in you whenever you meet. He is your personal motivational speaker. He gives you the same feeling you had after reading Gifted Hands for the first time. Suddenly, you feel inspired to work hard, achieve great things and get your name on the Hall of Fame.
The trouble is that you have become so attached to him that you cannot seem to do anything worthwhile without his presence.
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Your love for him has even placed unreasonable demands on the poor people in the clock. The lady must become a perfect ballet dancer, performing a full split whenever you decide to start cooking at 12:30 p.m. Meanwhile, the man must abduct his left upper limb to 90 degrees before you can make a trip to the salon or take a bath.
Even the clock hands are tired of your conditions.
Is it how you decide to become an excellent and studious student at the beginning of a new semester, only for the motivation you got from your friend to die after three weeks of knowing him? Oh my! You have to wait until you meet him again, and that will be at the beginning of the next semester. Too bad—that’s quite a lot of time to wait to see your supposed good friend again.
Did you just tell me that you will become responsible on your twenty-fifth birthday? That you will finally be a growwwnn woman?
Please!
You are in November, but you have decided that you can continue managing your relationship with SAPA until the first of January. Apparently, financial discipline is a New Year’s resolution, not a decision you can make today.
I’d be your Ken Saro-Wiwa, and no, you don’t have to wait until a particular date to get motivated again. You’ll reread this article and find me. Let the time on your birthday and wedding invitation cards be stated as 8:11 a.m. Tell someone to wake you up in the next 16 minutes, not 20. Decide to attend classes early on a Tuesday when you fail to do so on Monday.
And lastly, I dare you to break free from the fresh start effect—to challenge that conditioned reflex that tells you to wait until everything looks right before you take the first step.
Stop choosing to go to the market only when the clock goes ding-dong.
Go when you need to go.
Start when you can start.
Let the minute hand point wherever it pleases.
You do not need the perfect time. You need the courage to begin in the time you have.
