I recently received a private e-mail from one of you Warpies asking me a specific question. The question was, "What do you do when you can't think of anything to write about?"
Now I understand the person's question but I couldn't relate a really good answer because I have never had a writer's bloc. I often do have a problem deciding what to write about but that isn't the same thing.
I explained that the advantage I had over this person is I have stumbled through life on this planet for almost sixty years and just have so much more personal material to work with than this younger person has.
My recommendation was to live as long as possible and do at least one stupid thing each day. That way when you get to be my age, you have volumes of dumb things to write about.
The communication did make me look at my years in a different way. The first thing I did was find out how many days 60 years meant I had stumbled through life. The answer was 21,915. I guess that's a lot but I'm not sure.
21,000 is a big number if you are counting lines and wrinkles on your body but it isn't a very big number if you are computing how many beers you have had in your life.
I then decided to find out how many hours my time on Earth came out to and that is a much better number coming in at 525,960. Now that is a number worth bragging about. Anyone who can say they have lived half-a-million hours should get some kind of special recognition even if it is just from yourself.
If you know me at all, you know I had to continue to dissect this little bit of mortality down to the extreme. Sixty years of age means one has lived 3,155,760 minutes and a whopping, 189,345,600 seconds. Now those are numbers a person can be proud of.
I think this will make me look at things differently now. When someone asks me if I have a second, I will say. "Sure, I've already had 189 million of them so I think I can spare one for you."
When we leave a show and someone in the family says we just wasted a few hours on a really bad movie, I can reply, "Yes, but they were just a few in a half-million that I have had."
Now I know all of you are saying that I haven't factored in the time we sleep but that is a problem for you Earthlings and not for me. As an insomniac I can take maybe 20% off my totals and still have some numbers left that make for bragging.
Of course the real question is how many years and hours and minutes and seconds do I have left. That is an answer neither I, any of you or the family doctor who says I should be dead by now can answer with certainty.
It's funny, but as a young man I really worried about how much time I would have in this world. I even sold my soul to the devil once for a longer life. He brought it back invoking the defective merchandise clause in the contract.
I don't seem to worry about how much time I now have in front of me as I know in the scheme of things it has to be less than what I have already been given. There is no sense crying over spilled beer or wasted hours or minutes or seconds. I have had enough chances to make good with the number I have been given so if I have blown some time from time to time it isn't that significant.
I also feel better about the columns that I write now. I never have to worry again if I have wasted a few minutes of your time. All of you, of course, have enough of your own to waste a few now and then.
Freelance writer, columnist, author and writing coach, ex-Chicagoan Mike Fak presently resides in Central Illinois. More information about Mike's services are available at his home website www.mikefak.com
Mike currently writes humor columns for searchwarp bi-weekly and is the managing editor of www.lincolndailynews.com
Mike, I don't think you will ever run out of material for writing, will you? I got from this: "no regretting; get on with it!" Don't know if that was one of your themes, but it seemed so to me. If not, I like it anyway. A fun read.
Yes, I have regrets and wishes for other decisions over the years but I can either spend all my time lamenting past mistakes or try to get something productive out of the here and now.
Of course I might still be screwing up but at least I'm good at it.
Thanks Roschelle. In all honesty I like that line myself. I will include it in my next book titled, "The funniest things I ever said...although I don't remember when.
Check your math Mike. 31,557,600 minutes and 1,983,456,000 seconds. When you got up to the minutes you started leaving off a 0. Any idiot would know that 525,960 x 60 has to be more than 3,155,760. Funny article anyway. I just figured I would correct your blunderous mistake there.
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