Do you remember waiting?

We don't really have to wait for much anymore. Some of us are old enough to remember the squawks, chirps and hisses of a 56K modem as it strained to convert data into sound; never-ending load times on web pages; galling lag in our first-person shooters. And before that, there were the hours waiting for a friend to call back, days for the check to clear, weeks for that package or letter to arrive.

We're no longer any good at waiting. Our minds don't know how to handle the dead space, the quiet time between stimuli. We counteract the social anxiety of a long wait by swiping mindlessly across smartphone screens, searching for the next dopamine fix before the waiting sinks its teeth into us.

I enjoy waiting. It's the most effective silencer of the ego. A good wait, savored from start to finish, reminds us that regardless of the technology we use to thwart our senses, life's timeline will not unfold on our schedule. Waiting done right is a small death of selfishness. You are at the mercy of time, and in its own way, that is freeing.