Once upon a time, I was a punctual person. Early even. I got this habit from my parents. My mother, to this day, arrives early for everything (not always a great thing when you’re still rushing around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to get the house looking somewhere close to presentable). But somewhere between leaving home for college at 18 and now I have become perpetually late. For practically everything. If it’s something super important like a doctor’s appointment or a job interview or, say, the closing of my house, I’m still on time or early. But the day to day stuff like getting to work on time and out the door so that we’re seated before the previews begin when we decide to take in a flick–it just doesn’t seem to happen. I’ve gotten particularly bad since we moved because we are now 5 miles further out. It doesn’t sound like much, but when you are accustomed to living literally 5 minutes from everything (10 to the grocery)(and let’s face it, this probably did not help my punctuality issues), it makes a difference. Add to that I currently have a dog that still is not 100% in charge of her own bathroom habits yet (she needs help balancing when she squats still) and has physical therapy twice a week, and it adds up to being terminally late.
Mostly this hasn’t been an issue. I’m not an hourly employee and my boss doesn’t tend to roll in before 8:30. I figure if I beat her in, I’m probably doing fine.
But anyway, I’m on a crusade to get myself together and start being on time again because I was always taught it’s rude to be late (apparently this only really still registers with me if there’s food involved), and frankly, if I don’t get this under control NOW, then it’ll be like NOON when I roll up to work after we have kids. Obviously that would be a problem.
So in an effort to improve my punctuality, I’ve set daily alarms on my phone to remind me to finish getting ready for work and get my butt out the door. I also decided to eschew the internet until I get to work. I tend to get lost in checking email and good conversation via IM. So last night before bed, I shut OFF my laptop (something I rarely do) and did not turn it on this morning. So far, so good. I had intentions of reading during breakfast instead. Ha. Yeah. So didn’t happen.
I discovered it’s not just the internet that slows me down in the morning. It’s my tea. Because drinking tea, for me, is not about caffeine ingestion. It’s about approaching the day slowly, allowing my brain to wake up at its own pace while I linger over my daily cuppa. (Even though I’ve already been out of bed for over an hour and exercised, I do not qualify as awake yet). Yeah. There’s no time for lingering. My lingering takes minimum half an hour, usually more like 45 minutes. I don’t have that. I get up, feed the dogs, go run or whatever exercise I do, hit the shower by 7, scarf breakfast, and then need to be out the door. Ugh. So…travel mug. Which is so NOT the same as lingering with my favorite mug.
I also discovered I’m going to have to potty the dogs after my workout and before I hit the showers because it’s frigging HOT and all my makeup melted off this morning while I was waiting on Daisy to do her business. SHE was far more interested in trying to eavesdrop on the neighbor talking on the phone on the other side of the fence, and I definitely did not have time to wait on that. I look forward to being able to someday just let her out the door to go do her business, while I continue to get ready. I swear, I have no idea how anybody with small people gets anywhere on time EVER.
Anyway, I made it this morning at 8:05. I consider that a victory. I expect it will be a work in progress.
3 thoughts on “Project Punctual”
I’m on time for everything except work, and I’m trying so hard to do better. It’s embarrassing when everyone else is here and I’m dragging in. I have to walk by everyone else to get to my office.
I have a friend who is late all the time, and we talk about how rude that is. It IS rude when others are waiting on you. Not so much if it’s just you going to a movie or something. But it’s also a matter of self discipline, and you usually have tons of that in most areas. I think it’s just gotten to be a habit, and really, you need a free pass on this because of Daisy. (See how I made an excuse for you there?) Maybe when things get back to normal with her, and you get used to living farther away, you’ll get back to punctuality. 🙂
I have some friends who are always on time, some who are always late, some who are always early. One who’s terrible at judging time and is working to correct that.
I don’t think of it as “rude” or not; I just think of it as them.
Personally, I try to be on time or early—but not too early. But one thing I had to do for that was to set my watch 5 minutes fast, because I always forget to include the time it takes to park and walk from the car to the meeting place, when I’m figuring out how long it’ll take me to get somewhere.
I am often a few minutes late because I tend to think of how long it takes to get someplace based on the perfect scenario. Like, once I drove with all green lights and it took me only 14 minutes to get from Point A to Point B; so I forever expect to reach said destination in 14 minutes flat.
Duh. Life happens. Any little glitch happens, and I am late. I have also wanted to address this issue in my own life. The alarm sounds like a good idea!