just wastin' time

One of the places where I am most content is in front of a body of water. A seafront, a lakeside, even a nice riverbank. I just need somewhere to sit, some water to look at and some time to let pass.

There is calmness. Peace. Beauty to be found in the idleness.

Most of the time.

Lately, that idleness has begun to creep towards irritation. Some days, the stillness feels less like rest and more like waiting. Waiting for what, I’m not entirely sure.

From where I’m sitting, I can see motion. Creatures gliding past as they go about their day. In the distance, boats transport people to their next chapter. Yet here I stay. Sitting on the dock. Watching the tide roll in and roll back out again.

Just wastin’ time.

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The sight of a sofa startled me a few days ago.

Not just any sofa. One I hadn’t seen in years. An image from the office I worked in for all of four and a half days.

It was the four-year anniversary of my then ‘dream role’ being cut short. An event that was followed by months of rejection, yet another relocation, and a job that wasn’t quite what I’d envisioned.

That sofa marked the start of a lot of growth and change. Yet, as I sit and watch, I can’t help but notice how much is still the same.

Some of the disappointment that defined that season never truly left. It just got quieter. Many hopes I had back then still haven’t come to pass. Questions I assumed time would have answered by now still linger.

The sadness I thought was a distant memory was closer than I realised. It was just beyond the periphery of my vision, sitting on the dock beside me.

It seems content to sit, but I am not.

There has been a growing sense of restlessness with life. It shows up in interesting ways. A few weeks ago, I joked that I was bored enough to be radicalised and concocted a conspiracy theory blaming Big Denim for my broken zips. This clearly normal and rational line of thought is symptomatic of a mind craving motion. A growing suspicion that how things are isn’t necessarily how they have to be.

The question is what to do with it.

Part of me wants to hop on the next boat that passes, wherever it’s headed. Another part keeps saying I should pray about it. Both feel right, but neither feels sufficient. Prayer isn’t meant to be an excuse for inaction, but restlessness is a poor compass.

So I sit. Watching. Wondering whether all this sitting is patience, or just wastin’ time.

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Back in 1967, Otis Redding found himself on a houseboat in Sausalito, writing (Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay.

He told his wife he wanted to try something different musically. To change his style. Those around him worried it was too pop. But he kept at it anyway, working on it from summer through to November.

The man on the dock wasn’t idle at all. He was in transition. Still on the outside, while something new was taking shape within.

Then, less than three weeks after recording the song, Otis died in a plane crash. He was 26. He never heard it on the radio. He never saw it become his first number one. He didn’t even consider it finished. The story goes that the whistling at the end of the track was keeping a spot warm for a verse he never got to write.

While he was pivoting, his time ran out.

I’m not quite sure what to do with that. Part of me finds it comforting. The sitting was the making. What looked like idleness became the song he’s most remembered for. Another part of me finds it sobering. Everyone’s days at the dock are numbered. Tides roll in and out, but time only moves in one direction.

So, I find myself here at 27, sitting.

Whistling until the next verse takes shape.