The tragedy of waiting...
Hello, friends of @adsactly
I don't know what life will be like in other countries, but in Latin America and very specifically in Venezuela, people live daily waiting. Not only in squares or parks, but also in banks, supermarkets, bus stops, the street, in our homes. We hope that the person in charge of a ministry who talks on her cell phone with her friend about her plans for the night will attend us; we wait in line to buy food without the slightest hope that it will reach us; we wait in the emergency of a hospital knowing that life can go away in a second; we look forward to the miracle that never comes and will never happen, but we hold on to that idea, because they taught us that it is better late than never.
Because, if you do not perceive it, one of the tragedies of waiting, sometimes, is not knowing what we are waiting for or if what we are waiting for will come: the famous uncertainty of waiting. The other is the timelessness of waiting. There are moments in which our waiting has no limits, it is postponed daily, it is resized and even becomes infinite. We die without knowing what we were waiting for, we only live with the illusion that something will come and we patiently wait. As in Samuel Beckett's famous play, Waiting for Godot, where Vladimiro and Estragon stand firm, sustained by hope and self-deception, waiting for Godot who will never arrive.
If we check the portals of psychology, well-being or health, we will find thousands of works that tell us how we should joyfully assume the wait. In today's society, as a consequence of the stress in which the human being lives, we are urged to be patient, to wait for things to happen naturally, to comply with the times, without forcing or pressing things, and we are even encouraged not to look for them with the blessed phrase that "God's time is perfect". Keeping calm, letting flow, breathing, it seems are the mantras to lead a healthy life in this frenetic world.
I must admit with a certain shame that patience is not one of my virtues, I tend to be very impatient, and just sometimes I get tired of waiting. Personally, I try to be as punctual as possible so as not to make anyone wait, since I put into practice the saying "don't do what you don't like to be done". But in recent years I have lost the courage to be punctual or to do some diligence in any establishment, business, office, because the wait can be endless. In this ambush of history that we are living, Venezuelans can spend hours, under the inclement sun, to enter a supermarket, just for the simple fact of buying cheaper products. Today's Venezuelans get up early not because God is going to help them, but because they have to queue endlessly to take the transportation; because if they go to the bank, they still have to queue endlessly to get cash. In Venezuelan hospitals, people also queue to be cured, even though we know that in the end, it is to die.
If time is money, in my country we have wasted a great fortune. Here time does not advance, we are detained and in the worst case scenario, we walk backwards. Tragedy has the form of a waiting room, of a broken clock, of eternal darkness. As the poet Vicente Gerbasi said: "we come from the night and towards the night we go". Apparently, we cannot expect anything new or good from this moment we are suffering. Because, what do the cancer patients who don't get to get chemotherapy wait for; what do the political prisoners who don't have a date to get out of jail expect; the housewives what do they expect when they don't get the food; what do the workers expect when their wages don't reach them; what do we Venezuelans expect when we want this government to end? What are we waiting for? Nothing.
These days, I was amazed to see how a group of people, while queuing up to buy regulated products, decided to improvise, in the middle of the sun, a popular board game in Venezuela called dominoes. People waiting, laughed, played, shouted, made jokes. When I saw that I thought about how clocks stop, how an unoiled machine becomes paralyzed, how a car stopped for a long time becomes useless. I believe that in Venezuela we have resigned ourselves to waiting, even though we know, as in Waiting for Godot, that what we are waiting for will never come.
I hope you enjoyed reading this post. I invite you to vote for @adsactly as a witness and join our server in discord. Until the next smile. ;)
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCE
http://www.eluniversal.com/economia/35373/reportan-largas-colas-en-busca-de-dinero-en-efectivo
https://elcomercio.pe/mundo/actualidad/venezuela-largas-colas-comprar-alimento-fotos-noticia-486960
http://brujuladigital.net/reportajes/cientos-de-venezolanos-hacen-cola-frente-al-consulado-de-chile-para-obtener-una-visa-de-ingreso-a-ese-pais
Written by: @nancybriti
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it is true that waiting without certainty is like writing on the river. as time never wait for anybody, it is important we utilised it or end in vain, without finishing what we started. For your case it seems we have some similarity for you here in my country and other non develop countries. Hope we will wake up all and come with a useful solution! good day all!
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I like the image of writing in the river: everything is gone, there is nothing left and there can be infinite waiting. I think that the problem we have in many undeveloped countries is that we are very irresponsible and banal. The problem is that if we maintain this attitude, we will remain stagnant. Thank you for your comment, @aasanka!
you are welcome @nancybriti
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Waiting is a virtuevand you hardly find people that would do it and in most cases that is the result of tragedies...
It is true that it is a virtue, but I feel that the expectation cannot be endless, because then the expectation becomes tragedy, false, deception! Thank you for your comment, @cryptorg
Waiting is a very tedious job. we often feel how tired it feels just because of waiting. Waiting for someone, official or even waiting for something that is not yet clear. Often when we wait we do things that we later know we waste time. That's why we need to show culture on time not just because we're pretentious on time. but we do it because it becomes our personal characteristic. I get used to always getting ready to welcome people to come rather than arriving late for work matters, this is very good effect. I often see people just waiting by playing games to kill boredom. if I wait for someone I will definitely look for a useful business, write for example. We can pour the frustration of waiting by composing a poem. We can also use our smartphone to find new knowledge via the internet.
It's far more useful than playing games.
Warm regard from Indonesia thank you @nancybriti thank you @adsactly Thank you @steemit
Yes, I also carry books that I can read while I wait, or I carry pencil and paper in case inspiration appears, but I think it's a lack of respect, that I have to wait a long time for something and for someone. If waiting is a virtue, punctuality is also a virtue. Greetings, @rokhani
Tragic realization.
Well put:
I personally have issues with the maxim you quoted above (God's time is perfect), and it goes heyond the simple theological assumption. I think that what you noticed in that line, people playing dominoes, doing their best to enjoy the long wait, avoiding losing their minds or getting al ulcer out of sheer anger outbursts, is the result of asuming that whatever happens in beyond our control, that it is part of a bigger plan and that we have no saying in a higher power's decisions.
I think that that convinction is paralizing and it has contributed to our paralysis and the current state of comformism, resignation, and despair.
I share your frustration and I try to put myself in the possition of those who are having an even worse time (sick, in jail, mourning the untimely loss of loved ones) and it is a really bleak scenario we have.
I do my best every day to avoid wasting time and build some foundation for a new and better life but it is a mentally exhausting excercise.
Because of something I read out there, for a person to take seriously the lost time, a clock should not mark the elapsed time but the time we have left in life. Perhaps this way people would give more value to punctuality and to do really important and enriching things in this brief sigh that is life. Grateful for your comment, @hlezama.
Some thinkers and writers have differentiated between expectation and hope. For example, the poet Armando Rojas Guardia writes in his poem "Espera":Very accurate and necessary (as well as very well written) your reflections, @nancybriti. They become very pertinent to the indescribable reality that we Venezuelans live, as you show crudely in your post. Waiting has several faces: it is the action (or inaction) to which various undesirable circumstances subject you; it is the strategy of submission of a regime that manipulates even the pain and patience (or impatience) of the citizens; or the resignation of many, with a diffuse horizon that gets further and further away.
Thank you for your good post, @nancybriti. Greetings.
Waiting is fundamental to the creative act. It is part of a process that ends with the work. The fruit of waiting is precisely the work, the light. But there are sterile waits that lead to nothing, like this long wait in which our country finds itself! Greetings, @josemalavem
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With much pain I tell him that today I could not smile with his publication because what happens in Venezuela is a real tragedy. However, it seems to me that his reflection is extremely pertinent, urgent and necessary.
Why wait? What to expect? To achieve goals you have to arrange actions!
In life I have learned that everything happens in gerund. Dancing learn dancing, writing, you learn to write, draw learn drawing. For events to happen we must make them happen. He who expects something and does nothing can sit "waiting" as the popular saying goes.
What I am sure is that there are many people working, studying and researching in Venezuela and those actions will have to be well rewarded in the future. Do not doubt it. A big hug and a big greeting @nancybriti