I am a chronically late person. I am not proud of this. It is a flaw in my character, and I am certain many of you reading will agree, a significant one. Some people don’t seem to mind tardiness. I am lucky to know quite a few such people. But others, understandably, find chronic lateness the height of rudeness, and emblematic that an individual values their own time over that of everyone else.
My main issue is that I am easily distracted. I am somewhat childlike in my facility to have my attention captured by, well, literally anything. Most people grow out of this, but I seem to have grown further into it. (Although I suppose children don’t regularly catch sight of an interesting coverline on a copy of the New Yorker lying around the house, and get drawn into a 20,000-word article while shower-wet hair begs to be dried.)
A diagnosis of ADHD has been suggested by a psychiatrist (and, ahem, colleagues). And, in certain phases of mental ill health, I find it very difficult to gear myself up to leave the house, and feel deeply that my presence will only ruin any social event. So sometimes there are genuine reasons. Although I feel citing the studies that suggest lateness is associated with intelligence might be going too far. I think, with me, it has something to do with optimism.
It is a contented bliss, then, to be early. Habitual early birds probably will not experience this high. But I have a theory that one of the purest forms of happiness is relief. Relief has a lightness that unlocks carefreeness, which speaks to freedom, and freedom is happiness.
The extreme tension I feel when rushed and late, despite it being self-inflicted and a social form of self-harm, means that when I do manage to be on time, but even more so, early, it’s a felicity to savour. As an individual who will sometimes forget keys but never a paperback, any unexpected portion of time for reading is exciting. Earliness also offers the opportunity for observation; seeing the things one misses when flitting between modes of public transport, and walking with the determined velocity of Richard Ashcroft in the video for Bittersweet Symphony. Or I’ll just think about who I am meeting, and how pleasing it will be to spend time with them. Still, it will take a little more time (natch) for earliness to stick. Did I, for instance, file this column early, or even, to deadline? No comment.
