You Could Be Late, Or You Could Be A Tidsoptimist

Wearing pajamas all day = no wasting time changing clothes = more fun.

Many years ago, as we were late and hustling to get out of my brother’s house to attend a friend’s wedding for which I had volunteered to make 300-plus cupcakes in three different flavors—chocolate, carrot, and lemon, natch—our Swedish friend Martina, my brother’s girlfriend at the time, shook her head in good-natured exasperation and called me a word in Swedish that sounded like a mouthful of vowels and that I could only assume was a terrible insult. Although, Martina is too nice to do that, so I gave her the benefit of the doubt and asked politely, while trying to make little frosting carrots on top of cupcakes, “What did you call me?”

“A tidsoptimist,” she replied, whilst grabbing a frosting bag and making perfect little carrots that looked like carrots. Mine, I realized too late, looked more like little green and orange penises. “Your brother is one too. Actually, I think your whole family might be.”

She explained that a tidsoptimist translates to “time optimist” and it’s a nice way of saying that you’re chronically late. But not late on purpose, or late out of disrespect; more like you’re late because you perpetually think you can squeeze more out of a day than is humanly possible. For instance, trying to go for a mountain bike ride, swim in the river, and make pounds of buttercream frosting then frost hundreds of cupcakes by 3pm without ruining your one “fancy” dress. (And here I was thinking I was totally on it for baking the cupcakes the day before!)

I felt seen.

I’m happy to say that I’m a mostly recovering procrastinator these days, and I know I’ve talked about it before, but I used to arrive at the airport at the last possible minute before having packed at the last possible minute, and then I’d be in tears when inevitably there were travel issues. It was stressful at best, and simply not tenable now that I have a family.

However, as a proud tidsoptimist, I still try to squeeze way too much stuff into a perfectly normal day. Sometimes it even works in my favor.

Last Friday, we took the kids out of school early and drove to the coast to meet friends for a backpacking trip. After some major time miscalculations and a super long ferry wait (of course we can do school/work/drive/ferry/food/hike!!), we arrived at the trailhead at 8:30pm. Our permitted camp spot was three miles away. Luckily, it is June in the PNW and it stays light late. So, we tried our best to market it to the kids as a fun adventure: “You get to stay up late tonight! We get to hike in the moonlight! Let’s see if we can do it without headlamps!” They seemed mostly on board. We had a magical hike, made it to the camp spot just after ten, our friends found us, and the kids voluntarily put themselves to bed once the tents were set up, something they have never before done in history. We all had a blast, and the kids have been talking about the night hike since.

9:41pm June 6 in Washington.

Of course, other times we’ve had a lot of late night tears and tantrums (mostly mine) when things haven’t gone right on other trips when we’ve been overly ambitious, but this time our tidsoptimism paid off.

If the shoe fits, sometimes it pays to keep wearing it!

Some links for the week:

Relatable feeling, for most of my adult life (“I’ll have kids in a few years,” via The New Yorker)

These are the best biscuits! I’m thinking they need to be made soon as a strawberry shortcake vehicle. (Touch of Grace Biscuits by Shirley Corriher, via food.com)

A video called The Denali Experiment by The North Face about a trip I was a part of many years ago. I haven’t watched it in a long time but it came up recently in conversation and is pretty hilarious. (15 minute video, via Youtube.)

Thanks for reading!

—Ingrid

So many tide pools, so little time.