Wait Times
“Our next available operator will be with you shortly. Your wait time is less than four minutes.
”
I love the automated messages that tell me how long I have to wait. I don’t even mind if they say I have to wait ten minutes. At least I know.
No one likes to wait without a prescribed time limit. Yet, again and again, we find ourselves learning the same lesson from a new facet.
Writing is made up of waiting sessions
As a writer, I should be well-practiced at waiting. Just one book features dozens of waiting sessions:
- Waiting for the plot to set up like Jell-o, no longer sloshing over the sides but sitting firmly in its place.
- Waiting for your word count to accumulate past 500 words, 5,000 words, 50,000 words.
- Waiting to reread your work, knowing it is both far better and far worse than you remember.
- Waiting for the perfect revelation to spackle that plot hole or properly motive your flim-flam antagonist.
- Waiting for your beta readers to let you know what they thought.
- Waiting to gulp down the bitter syrup of truth and apply the plentiful changes your partners suggested.
- Waiting to hear from the agent—hoping for the best but resolved to gain useful knowledge either way.
- Waiting to find out if this book is the “one” or if you need to start back at square one.
Waiting is a symptom of life
But some waits are harder than others. Some waits cement you to the minute, refusing let time tick by in its proper clippity-clop manner. It screeches and drags like an anchor scrapping across gravel. These waits seem longer, harder, crueler.
- Waiting to see your baby’s fingers and toes in real life and hear that blessed scream, indicating that everything will be okay.
Waiting to hear that your loved one has finally left this world, shrugging off the worldly pain like a wool coat.
Waiting to hear if you got the job out of state.
Waiting to see if your house sells or if you should investigate bankruptcy paperwork instead.
Waiting to hear if the biopsy is clear.
There is a lesson in each wait. And it is seldom the same lesson each time. I like to delude myself into thinking that if I puzzle out the lesson fast enough, the wait will end—the cheesy treat at the end of the maze. But the wait can’t be shortcut, condensed, boiled down or quartered. It takes up the space it was allotted and we either move around it, carrying on with the rest of our non-waiting lives or we sit down and stare at the wait.
Either way we wait…
And wait…
And wait…
What are you waiting on?
Most of the time I’m waiting in the pick-up line, then waiting on violin lessons to be over, scouts, basketball practice, and whether or not today is the day I submit something. At my age, can’t wait too long. Liked your piece, good advice. Hope to see you at the Erma workshop. I’m witht the “bird’ group.