Friday

Save time -- or time saver?

Why does living in the era of time-saving devices seem to make life more hurried? It is as if we are compelled to keep up with the pace of our time-saving devices.

We don’t save time, because it can’t be done, just as Jim Croce sang in “Time in a Bottle”: “If I could save time in a bottle”.

There is a scene in one of my favorite movies: Sabrina, starring Julia Ormond and Harrison Ford, when they are going to fly to Martha’s Vineyard in a private jet -- which they were taken to in a helicopter -- ‘to save all that time fighting traffic.’ Ford’s character, Linus, is working away on papers.


Sabrina (Julia Ormond) asks:
“Don’t you ever look out the window?”
“When I have time.”
“What happened to all that time you saved taking the helicopter?”
He replies offhandedly, “I’m storing it up.”
She then matter-of-factly says, “No you’re not.

As “Time in a Bottle” and that scene from Sabrina highlight, time can’t be saved up. We use it one way or another, while we are in that moment. This being the case, time-saving devices is a misnomer: they should be called ‘get-the-job-done-faster-devices’.
"Time in a Bottle" lyrics
Noe

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