I used to read as I walked to school. Yes, I did have accidents, quite frequently, as it happens, but there just weren’t enough hours in the day, and as I came home for lunch, that meant four lots of 15 minutes – a whole extra hour for reading! I found out what Katy did, then what she did at school, and what she did next, and flew with Biggles over France in WWI, all on the way along the High Street, past the cemetery with the wall that looked like rotting teeth as it crumbled into broken-bricked chaos, and was even known to miss the sweetshop, so engrossed was I.
It had to stop when I started work, of course. You can read while you cycle, but it’s really best not to.
In recent years I’d rather let slip the practice of utilising the odd 15 minutes, being more inclined to recline in a chair in the period after lunch and before I need to go back to work. But something got me started again. It happened like this.
We have a green wheelie bin which, if we fill it and put it on the pavement every second Thursday, is emptied by the nice men from the council. As we have an enormous garden and already have four compost bins and two ‘active’ heaps, there’s really nowhere left to put non-rotting prunings from shrubs and trees, and all those various slimy lumps of stuff that get forgotten behind the summerhouse or stuffed down the side of the shed. So when, for the measly sum of £10 we were offered a green wheelie bin for garden waste, well . . . !
Then, one Monday last autumn I realised the bin was empty and if I didn’t get off my bum, the bin men would not find their work quite as fulfilling as they had a fortnight earlier. I had three days to make the bin ‘wheelie’ full! (Sorry!) But, the evenings having drawn in, I didn’t fancy lugging garden grot about in the gloom (spiders – EEK! I can take the frogs, bats, and other creatures of the night, but not the arachnids) so there was only one thing to do. I set aside that sleepy 15-minute slot Monday to Wednesday. And I did it! On the Thursday morning when I wheeled out the bin, it was stuffed! Another load off our minds – not to mention from behind the summerhouse.
There was something else those 15-minute slots did for me, though. Not only did they provide exercise out in the fresh autumn air, they got me unwound. Apart from requiring me to pop into other people’s office as the job requires it, mine is sedentary work. And I found that, rather than making me even more tired in the afternoons, as I thought they might, those 15 minutes of activity actually increased my afternoon energy levels, even improving the get-up-and-go of the ‘little grey cells’. I’ve also started whistling again, something I haven’t done for years!
In fact, I’ve begun to feel so well that I’m going to move into that insufferable class of people who can’t help giving advice, and suggest a few things that can be achieved in fifteen minutes if you, too, want to feel invigorated and more like whistling as you work!
As the idea is that you do something that must be done but you never seem to have the time for it, and as the idea is also to frolic in a bit of fresh air and sunshine when available, the suggestions are mainly in the garden, and are what I call ‘clean’ jobs. but you could apply them to other areas of life if all you have is a window box.
Here’s what I managed to accomplish in six 15-minute slots this past week:
Deadhead ta huge patch of daffodils. Later on it will be twenty fuchsias, or fifteen geraniums, or one hanging basket (I’m only planning one this year).
Sweep the front drive.
Feed the goldfish in my half-barrel water feature, allowing plenty of time for teaching them to take food from my hand. (They’re so cute when they suck on my fingers by mistake!)
Check our 25 rosebushes for aphids.
Edge the lawn (which really makes the garden look so much tidier, even if you can’t mow till the weekend).
Trim three early-flowering shrubs (half-filling that wheelie bin!).
Well, you can see where my passion lies (a long way from the laundry basket) but if you don’t have a garden you could:
Vacuum a couple of rooms.
Clean two windows (in a few days the whole lot will sparkle).
Iron two shirts (the editor says he might just manage one in that time!)
Give the bathroom a brisk wipe.
Change a bed.
Have a rough ball-game with the dog or cat (it’s OK to have fun too!)
Hopefully, you’re bursting with your own ideas by now. And it doesn’t have to be chores. You could spend the 15 minutes on the trampoline, fast-walking, jogging, or just junking your junk mail.
Try it. Feel fresher! Bask in the buzz from blotting something from your ‘must-do’ list. Get the little grey cells galloping around. And while you’re at it, start whistling again!
I used to read as I walked to school. Yes, I did have accidents, quite frequently, as it happens, but there just weren’t enough hours in the day, and as I came home for lunch, that meant four lots of 15 minutes – a whole extra hour for reading! I found out what Katy did, then what she did at school, and what she did next, and flew with Biggles over France in WWI, all on the way along the High Street, past the cemetery with the wall that looked like rotting teeth as it crumbled into broken-bricked chaos, and was even known to miss the sweetshop, so engrossed was I.
