Does True Boredom Have A Place In My Life(Len Daniels) Does True Boredom Have A Place In My Life


When I was first given this assignment, my first thought was; how do you write about something boring when the only good and memorable thing about it would be to try and forget it. This made me stop and think about the subject. Does a person really forget about a boring experience or do we remember it so that we can try to keep from experiencing it again. This posed a daunting challenge.

Since I've tried to keep myself from being bored, for most of my life, there have been times that I wished my time were being spent in a more productive manner. Take for example, when I used to travel the country doing cable TV work when it was in its infancy. I would board an airplane in one place and fly perhaps for two hours to another place just to visit a job location. I'm not much of a reader of non-essential books, and I simply cannot sleep soundly, while propped up in an airplane seat, and it seemed as though whenever I was on a plane trip, there always was some loud-mouthed flyer in the back who could be heard talking and laughing all over the cabin, so I dreaded this part of my job. I often would elect to drive from place to place, instead of fly. At least I could stop along the way to keep myself from getting bored, but invariably, the time constraints would prevent me from driving. I often wondered how people who take trips overseas, keep from going crazy for four or five hours.

I remember when I was in the Army back in 1958, when all the boredom in your lifetime can be summed up in these words; "HURRY UP AND WAIT." Boy was that BORING!!

I have been bored in church to the point of dozing off for a few minutes during the sermon. I know I'm not alone in this, since I witnessed the same thing with many other individuals. I've been bored while engaging in conversation in which I have no interest in, nor care about. This is the worst kind, since I wouldn't want to appear rude to my fellow listeners and leave the scene, so I try to put on an interested face, while I'm still extremely distant.

As part of this assignment, we were instructed to inject a bit of humor into the subject of boredom. Since boredom itself fosters thoughts of displeasure, how do you find something humorous in it? Here's my attempt, and I had to really dig down deep in my memory for this.

I had been seeing a girl for several, months and we were out on a date with another couple. After going our separate ways the two of us subsequently ended up at her house at about midnight and started "making out" as we called it in those days.

About fifteen minutes into the session, I noticed her facial expression had changed, and she appeared distant. This concerned me since I was feeling pretty good by this time and wondered what was wrong. I asked her several times, if there was something bothering her. She replied, "I'm bored." At this point, all amorous interest left me, and we started to talk. I had realized before this that my advances toward her had not gotten the response that I was used to from other girls, but they never complained that they were “BORED.” This really shot me down, and when she confessed that she'd rather have female companionship instead of a boyfriend, I left in a hurry, never to return again. This wasn't funny in the "HA-HA" sense of the word, but it was funny in the fact that she didn't let on earlier in our relationship that she was gay.

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