I read something once that said something like "The way you live your life is how you live each day." This might have been written in a pretty cursive font over a picture of a waterfall. Ask Mark Zuckerberg why I had to read such a witless aphorism.

But "Anonymous" has a point (the people who make these things seem to like to attribute the quotations to someone named Anonymous, instead of just, like, not putting any attribution at all. Why?). Each silly day adds slowly up to a silly life. Here's how I spent a recent Friday morning during my winter vacation:

I woke up to my alarm at 7:25am. This was four hours and 37 minutes earlier than I had woken up the day before. The sun was shining in through the windows. The night before, I had left the curtains open, to better arouse myself in the morning with the fresh light of day. It sort of worked. I was up.

I checked my email. I glanced at the news headlines. I--dangerously--closed my eyes for a minute. I opened them again. To my relief, not much time had passed. I double checked the train schedules. 9:22am from Penn Station. I checked the weather. I opened CityMapper and asked it when I should leave my home to get to Penn Station by 9:15am. A full seven minute buffer, probably even enough time to grab an Electric Mermaid acai bowl from Playa Bowls. The journey, CityMapper said, would take 25 minutes. Leave by 8:50am.

I started reading a blog post about AI coding assistants. I went to the bathroom and brushed my teeth.

I lay back down in bed. I thought about whether to make peanut butter toast. I decided that it would be best to make it right before I left and eat it on the walk to the subway. I couldn't eat it right then because I had to wait at least 30 minutes after taking my medicine before eating. I finished reading the blog post. I checked the weather again. I got dressed and packed my bag. It was 8:38am now, somehow.

I went to the bathroom again. There was no time for toast now. Plus, I didn't want my hands to get cold while I ate. I grabbed a granola bar and left. It was 8:45am--five minutes ahead of CityMapper's proposed departure time, leaving me with a whole hypothetical 12 minutes to buy a train ticket and a Playa Bowl. Oobh I got plany off time.

I ate the granola bar in the elevator.

When I got to the L platform, the board told me that the next train was five minutes away. Not great, but not too bad. The train, when it came, was crowded. I squeezed in and found myself in the middle of the car width-wise and the near the front length-wise. There were no poles within reach, so I had to hold on to a little groove in the ceiling. I wondered if they put those grooves there specifically for this purpose. It felt kind of greasy. Luckily, despite the how crowded it was, there was enough room in front of me to hold my book. I read.

The L progressed at a reasonable rate without delays. I arrived on the ACE uptown platform at 9:08am. Theoretically, this would give me plenty of time to go one (via the A) or two (via the C or E) stops to Penn Station. But, alas, the next train was not expected to arrive for a whole nother eight minutes. For this station at this time of day on this day of the week, this long interval was quite unusual. Behind me, a fellow traveler was also surprised. "Eight fucking minutes?" he sighed.

I thought.

I texted my friends to tell them that I was going to miss the train and would be an hour late. "Fine by me," they each said.

The C arrived at 9:17am. I tried to read some more of my book, but I just stared at the words blankly. I raced off the train at Penn Station, hurried down the platform, dodged strollers and suitcases, sprang out the turnstiles, jogged down the hallway, up the stairs and into the waiting area and--too late. It was 9:24am. The 9:22am to Dover wasn't even on the board anymore. Alas, alas, alas.

It was only the second time I had ever missed a train, despite the fact that I am habitually late everywhere else.

The next train was at 9:50am. I caught my breath, bought a train ticket from the kiosk, bought an Electric Mermaid, and then ate it in the waiting area. I made the 9:50am and reached Millburn by 11:00am. My friends arrived simultaneously and we walked in the woods for a couple hours. Everything exactly according to plan, if only an hour later. C'est ma vie.