Each summer I try and immerse myself in the process of increasing my understanding about a particular area of interest and curiosity. As one in possession of (or possessed by) an obsessive brain, a brain that generally hinges on an “all-in” or “all-out” approach to most everything, dedicating specific timeframes to specific things seems to have always been the way of it.

To fellow full-immersion folks, sometimes it’s best to float your boat in what you’ve been given, and resign yourself to the ebb and flow of the currents it produces. Maybe not full resignation, but a somewhat purposeful heading toward the general direction of your curiosities and interests. During that somewhat purposeful drift, also try and maintain the ability to recognize when enough is enough. Often easier said than done.

For instance, and completely hypothetical, recognize that even though eggs are good for you, that eating six a day, every day, until you find yourself repulsed by the thought of an egg is full-immersion gone beyond the “enough is enough” boundary. Or, take heed if someone (hypothetically your wife) suggests that gray suede wingtips are lovely, but four pairs of the exact same pair of them might be enough. As I said, “completely hypothetical”.

Why are some particular things of more interest than other particular things to particular people? Our curiosities are curious.

The cinnamon rolls I made a few weeks ago were of particular interest to me because the memories they evoked are particular to a place, a time, and a person. A person that’s gone now, a place that lingers, and a time that is accessible only to me. So it goes.

To anyone not knowing that place, that time, or that person, those rolls are just rolls. Just some flour, some cinnamon, some butter. But, they are something more. My grandma Rose’s tried and tested recipe are a taste of pure love, the taste of a life well lived.

For whatever reason it’s been several years since I’ve made those rolls, but for whatever reason, it felt like time to give them another go. It felt like time to say “thank you”, time to say “we’ve got this”, time to maybe say “goodbye” a little bit more than I’ve allowed myself. Mostly, I felt like sharing all this with my family, just as she had shared with all of us.

These particular things, tie us to particular people, to particular places, to particular times. We’re all they’ve got. We have the power to give the finitude of their being a bit more time. Perhaps when we give their being a bit more time, when we share their love, their recipes, with those we care for, then we in turn give ourselves a bit more time? Isn’t that what we all want?

As the Roman Stoic philosopher, Seneca The Younger, once said, “Life is long, if you know how to use it.” Spending your time attending to things that bore you to tears, and do nothing to stir interest and curiosity in you, can also make time ease by painfully slow. I don’t think that’s what he meant, but it’s probably what some of Seneca’s fellow Roman’s felt like when he was philosophizing in the bathhouse while trying to get wine stains out of his toga.

Seneca The Younger? Not from this angle.

Life is all about how you look at it, and it looks even better with a tray of Grandma’s cinnamon rolls cooling on the kitchen counter.