Spring Break and the Power of Preference

Jenny is on Spring Break this week which means I’m kind of on Spring Break. My usual morning routine gets me up at about 5:00 for dog-walking, breakfast-making, lunch-making, freelance-project-onworking, sun-saluting, and sudoku-completing. All of which must be finished by 7:30 am (in time for my morning commute). Except for items five and six, although if I don’t do those the rest of the day is ruined. Fortuitously I’m between freelance projects so with Jenny around all day to help with items one through three I only have to worry about items five and six.

When I was in grad school (age 24), a friend in her 50s (actually my room-mate’s second cousin) said something like “oh I remember grad school. It was wonderful to have time to read.” I thought she was on drugs — “geez I’m working all the time now, aren’t I?”

Oh man I had no idea. My life is end-to-end full in such a way that I’ve redefined “vacation” to mean “I feel like I have enough time to do the work I have to do.” I can’t wait to see what happens to my schedule when the kid arrives. (How do people with children — people I actually know — have time to watch TV? Or play video games? Luxury!)

The hell of it is, I like it this way. Thus the power of preference: you will do more of things you like. If you learn to like freelance work and dog-walking and making breakfast and lunch for your spouse, you will want to do those things and enjoy doing them. They still feel like chores but I don’t begrudge them.

I was recently discussing daylong bike rides with another young father recently. He said: “get in as many daylong rides as you can, because after your baby comes you wont’t have any more time for fun.” I said: “well I have to learn how to have fun with my son.”