Fast Forward

She was always looking forward. To the next day, next week, next year, next traffic light. Goal oriented was too mild a term. She was so focused on what was ahead of her she almost never noticed what was happening around her, or for that matter, to her.

I just wish I could fast-forward past this part, she often thought to herself when the daily routine got to be too much. She visualized a movie montage set to the soundtrack of some hip music showing weeks or months of her life's drudgery in moments, maybe with dancing, allowing her to skip ahead to the payoff of a vacation or a project completed.

One morning she awoke in a blur. Everything rushed around her and she realized she too was moving at a more rapid speed. As she sipped her morning coffee she wasn't able to taste the dark warmth because she was already speeding forward to her shower, whose pounding massage she didn't feel because she was already dressed and zipping through morning traffic.

Soon the tiny moments she never realized she savoured - the taste of good chocolate, her lover's body pressed against hers - were flashing past so quickly she could no longer feel them nor remember what they felt like. The days turned into months, then years, then decades. At the end of her life she expected a chance to reflect back on her experiences but she'd simply run out of time.