I read enough articles over the past year or so about how time had gotten mushy or fuzzy or weird that the articles all blurred together. None of the metaphors were wrong, and none were right. Time and experience were somehow different—out at least they felt that way, which is all that matters on the internal accounting ledger.

One metaphor I recall is about the eternal holing-up as a kind of out-of-body experience. That seemed close to the mark, but still off. It did sometimes feel like observing myself from outside of myself. I can attribute that to boredom off and by routine—watching myself click-whir through the gear-like motions of the day, day after day.

One thing I don't like about this metaphor: "out-of-body" implies going back to the body, that is, just temporarily being out. Why do that? In some cases, sure, sounds good, but in all cases? Nah. Back to normal implies that we had it altogether in Ye Olde Tymes, but that doesn't seem right. Individually, collectively, we had Problems.

What if, instead, we—and by we I mean I—had a different body experience? Just... wake up whenever we wake up, and decide that we are now different? At least choose, consciously, which parts to keep, and which parts to discontinue. Maybe the bad habits and the bad times and the bad ideas come back eventually, even if you ditch them, but it's worth approaching the world as if it is fresh and green, and you are, too. Try something different in the grace period of reemergence.

A line from Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club that follows me, uninvited:

If I could wake up in a different place, at a different time, could I wake up as a different person?