The Importance of waiting

There are some things I wish I knew when I was younger, things I wish someone had hinted to me or so before I turned nineteen. Things like the importance of waiting. My mother used to say “life is not short, it is a pretty long journey, don’t rush anything.” She’d say this while making dumplings on the stove. Like a dumpling, you can’t rush it. First you make the dough, add on all your ingredients then there’s the cooking part. You need a plastic which keeps all the moisture in, allowing it to rise, my mother would put water in a big pot and a lid inside the boiling pot, then place the mixed dough which was in a plastic in the pot, closing with another lid. Imagine all that heat, plus the amount of time it takes for it to be ready. By the time, me as a kid I would sit by the kitchen and wait, savouring the smell. I waited up until it was ready.

This now that I am older has taught me the importance of waiting until something or one is ready. I mean imagine if I had rushed in the pot and took out a piece of what was still the mixed dough, I would’ve eaten nothing but disgusting dough. So why do we rush things, why do we jump into everything like we are given exactly ten or eight years to live. And oh how we use “life is short” “you only live once” clichés that don’t actually get us anywhere. Yes people do pass on, every single day. This doesn’t necessarily mean you need to jump off the cliff and kill yourself. Life is long, yes it is. I have been alive for 19 years, 6940 days including leap years with an extra day each, 166560 hours, 9993600 minutes. I could go on and on, the numbers will grow even longer and fill up this page.

What I am trying to say is, if you also took your time and sat down, no matter if you’re fifteen or ten, you realise just how long life still is. So why rush things, why don’t you take your time and forget about death which may be around the corner. What are you scared of so much that you are in a hurry to “live” truth is, you are going nowhere fast.

I rather go somewhere slow, than hit a huge bump, fall in a pit because I am rushing off to a place I don’t even know much about. Dating, seriously once you get to university you’ll see just how much what you were doing when you were in high school was all a waste of time. As for sex, now that doesn’t go away too. Wouldn’t you rather have it with the right partner than have it with who you thought when you were fifteen “was the love of your life”.

There are so many people in this world, numbers don’t lie. Wait, get your life in order travel and you’ll see just what I mean. But oh, the way we just look outside the window and see our young boy neighbour and freeze our thoughts thinking he is the one God sent for us. Wait dear child, wait. As for drinking, I honestly do not support alcohol but, if you reckon it’s a good way to have some fun. Imagine sitting at a bar, which pretty much has all high classed alcohol, that time you are a business man that is world renowned you can afford any glass or bottle of a 1970’s wine brought to your face. Now why wouldn’t anyone want such a life? Why would you rather force yourself to cheap beer that will tarnish your looks, your tiny liver, those good looking teeth and worst of all your dignity? Wait dear child, wait. Wait for the right man, wait for the right time to do everything. Yes there is a right time, the right time is when you’ve found yourself.

Truth is you can’t be with anyone if you don’t know yourself. As much as it takes a long time to truly know someone, it requires patience and determination to learn ad read yourself. Sit down with yourself, get to know who you are. Trust me, it’s a wonderful exercise. If you rush things, drink underage, commit to a relationship you’re not even intellectually prepared for, the process of learning about you will be interrupted. Then one day you end up in the wrong job, wrong marriage, wrong place and when you were fifteen you thought life was short. Now you’re forty. Your life sure did end early.

Child, there is no use rushing into anything. Everything you need is on this earth. You were born into it, you will pass on and leave it behind. Everything that is on this earth will never finish off before you do. Men, they are born every day. Alcohol is manufactured every day. And as for sex, trust me you wouldn’t want to have it with the wrong person. You won’t lose yourself if you just wait, if you take your time and wait you will not lose your life either. I waited for the dumpling until it was ready. And boy did it taste good. Better than eating uncooked dough.

Now why would you want to eat uncooked dough? Wait dear child, wait.