Spontaneous Human Construction.

I once made a quip to a friend that he could name any time on any day in the next 6 months and I could tell him exactly where I'd be and precisely what I'd be doing.

He did and I could.

I was only a little surprised by this. My friend thought I was making it up as I went along but he has since come to realize that I was being completely honest.

I have a tight schedule. It's true. To do all the things I want and need to do there is no other way. I have a steady contract job for 30hrs a week, a consulting job for another 10, a small business, a wife, a step daughter and a 2 year old. I also race my bike from time to time, play poker, eat too much good food, drink too much good wine and sleep too little.

The only way to manage this is to construct my life in such a way as to have clearly delineated blocks of time devoted to specific activities or serving certain functions. From x to x I train. I have 60 minutes to shower, shave, eat and be on my way to my next activity. Once that is done I have 30 minutes to have coffee at the local caffeine hut with some fellow addicts and then I have 3 hours where I do something else specific. On on and on.

So is this a good thing or a bad thing? Am I being efficient with my time or does my life lack any spontaneity? I guess it is a glass half full or glass half empty question.

I know one thing, you can't mix the two.

To train properly requires structure and discipline. It's pretty tricky to sustain this if the rest of your life is a mess. I know I can't do it. If I'm not fairly organized in my life and how I approach all of the things that I do then that spills over into my training. If I have a decent handle on my life then the training structure seems to fall into place.

But does this mean that all spontaneity has to go? Isn't there any wiggle room here? I've never been successful at planning time to be spontaneous. It just never works out.

Maybe I'm painting too grim a picture here. Maybe there is spontaneity in my life after all but it's simply taken on a different form that it had when I was a twenty-something.

When I was a swinging dick I could pile into a car with a buddy and drive half way across the county with $100 in my pocket and then hitch-hike home. That was pretty spontaneous.

When it was summer and I was young I could decide to not get up from the my sandy, well molded plot of sand on the beach, and to have another cold one instead and to go to class...tomorrow.

When the music was right and we were feeling alright I could choose the brunette over the blonde. That would be pretty spontaneous.

But that was spontaneity when I was young.

Things are a little different now.

Now I can choose to turn left instead of right on my Tuesday ride. I can choose to do 1 minute or 5 minute intervals. I can choose orange or lemon stuff to put in my water bottle.

Or I can spend ANY amount of time with my son. When you spend time with a 2 year old it's pretty hard to lay down any concrete plans. He likes to play baseball with daddy, or basketball with daddy or soccer with daddy or some kind of baseketsoccerpuzzleduckykickrunfalldownball with daddy. The few hours I get to play with him most every day are probably the most spontaneous of my adult life.

I can also choose what restaurant to go to with my wife (actually I can suggest but she can choose). I can also choose to order pizza or cook a nice meal at home.

I can choose which Japanese beer, French wine or Russian vodka will accompany me to our weekly poker game. I can even choose to play sober and maybe win some money. Heck, I can even decide to stay home!

Looked at this way, realizing that perhaps I was mistaking spontaneity with a lack of responsibility, helps me whenever I feel that the repercussions of just ditching whatever else I've got going on that day and pissing into the wind would be just too great.

I've come to realize that the time I've blocked in over the next few hours to do something that I'm not all that thrilled about affords me the time that I've blocked in to do things that are a benefit to those I care about or are things I truly enjoy.

Maybe having a family, two jobs, a start up and racing my bike isn't a jam packed, tied down, responsibility laden life but is a full, balls to the wall, getting something out of every minute lifestyle that leads somewhere.

Oh perspective how I love you.

And now we dance!