Does it Matter?

I have sixty seconds to live in 8:30 AM. Once the zero becomes a one, the chance to live that minute is forever gone. There will be no October 2, 2023,, at 8:30 AM ever again. 

I have sixty minutes to live the hour of three in the afternoon. Three thousand six hundred seconds of time ticking away. 

I have 24 hours to live a single day. Seven days in which to live a single week. A month, a year, a decade. These only matter in the face of passing time. 

In twenty years, will it matter what I did that afternoon in high school when I read for three hours straight?  In five years will it matter what I ate for breakfast this morning? In one year, will it matter if I was maximally efficient for the minimal amount time I can stay at maximum? In one month will I care if my bed was made every morning of every day? In one week, will it matter if I completed every task on my daily to-do? In one hour, will it matter how I just spent the last? In one minute, will I care how I responded to another person?

How I respond one minute adds up to the consequences of years. It matters no matter the time frame. 

The build-up of hours is all we have in this life, so it matters what I do. 

But when I get to the passing of weeks, the passing of months and years, in retrospect, how much do the little things matter? I can’t even remember what felt so urgent a year ago or even a month ago. 

Time, looking ahead is a mist. Time, looking back becomes misty. Time, right now, is all I have. But will it matter, this choice I make right now, later? Perhaps. But perhaps not. It depends on the consequences.