I had barely wrapped up the leftover turkey and cleared away the dishes, when I sat down at my computer, ready for some mindless, post-entertaining Web surfing.
Instead, I got clobbered with a menacing email query: “Need last-minute gift solutions?”
Instantly, my pulse started racing and my palms turned clammy. How could this be? How could I already be playing catch-up? Only after checking the calendar and — OK, knocking back a few handfuls of M&Ms; — did I reassure myself that panic was premature.
Later, though, my anxiety curdled into annoyance at these insidious forces that keep us on edge and back on our heels.
Somehow, Thanksgiving got swallowed up by Black Friday, which this year was speed-dialed up to Monday — and family togetherness morphed into storming the mall en masse, in search of a 50-inch flat-screen TV. It’s only a matter of time until elves and fireworks are all intertwined on the same clearance table.
Of course, the holiday marketing machine is hardly alone in delivering that familiar jolt of unease.
Following the long, slow slog of the presidential campaign, the country, you would think, earned a respite from shrill political discourse. But barely 48 hours after Florida had moved into the Obama column, Public Policy Polling announced that if the Iowa caucuses were held today, Hillary Rodham Clinton would be the front-runner by a large margin.
Really? 2016? And to think all we craved was a postelection cigarette.
While holidays and politics are just the most recent manifestations of the “What’s next?” syndrome, no sector of our society is immune.
After the World Series, I am enthralled by grown men jumping around like young boys who’ve just clinched the Little League title, but that unabashed elation doesn’t last very long. The Champagne is barely uncorked before some broadcaster asks, “How do you like your chances for next year?” and the celebration dissolves into a sobering analysis of free agents and salary caps.
Young adults in that sweet spot of courtship — where no one has yet succumbed to sweatpants — understand how quickly the conversation shifts from Saturday night plans to china patterns.
Not that getting married ends the harangue. Once you tie the knot, you’ll be pelted with more questions, all designed to make you feel hopelessly behind the eight ball: When are you buying a house? Starting a family? Moving into a bigger house?
And nowhere is that angst more on full display than in parenting. Crawling, walking, breast-feeding, pacifier-sucking, toilet-training, preschool registration … the list of ways to keep that pot boiling under you is endless. On the surface, it may sound like it’s about developmental milestones, but it’s really a way for friends and relatives to find out: “How are you screwing up your kids … and are you on schedule?
The accelerated timetable tapers off for a while — until around freshman year of high school, when SATs and career paths start looming on the horizon. Andrew Ferguson captured the absurdity of it all in the book “Crazy U: One Dad’s Crash Course in Getting His Kid Into College.” When a counselor told him that to write the kind of essay that would open the door to a top-tier school, his son needed to “dig down deep and let us hear his innermost thoughts,” Ferguson replied: “Lady, he’s a 17-year-old boy. He doesn’t have any innermost thoughts.”
Technology has provided today’s marketers with an unprecedented “opening” into our lives, allowing them to stir up all those insecurities — and buying behaviors — like never before, according to Mark Ingwer, a Chicago-based business researcher.
If it’s a relatively short-term relationship — say, investing in a private college consultant to help Junior crack the Ivy League — “then preying on people’s fears will probably work,” said Ingwer, author of the new book “Empathetic Marketing: How to Satisfy the 6 Core Emotional Needs of Your Customers.”
But if a company seeks a long-term relationship, keeping you constantly unsettled will almost certainly backfire. “Customers will recognize the disingenuousness. … They want to be more than an open wallet.”
Forward thinking is not all negative of course. Sonja Lyubomirsky , a clinical psychologist and author of the book “The Myths of Happiness” due out in January, says that if we weren’t looking ahead, we’d stagnate. “On one hand, if we were always content, we human beings would never make progress,” she explained. “On the other, it’s important to luxuriate in the present moment, so you can remember the taste, smell … everything about where you are right now.”
But savoring life’s momentary pleasures is really difficult when we’re all so hyperfocused on what’s coming around the corner. So why can’t we all opt out of this breathless race? Can we enjoy the journey just a bit more and worry about the destination just a little less?
As an empty nester, I know only too well how quickly this ride is over. One moment you’re selecting “Star Wars” wallpaper, and then — boom! — you’re turning the same bedroom into an office. So, let me linger in the now for a while, without prodding me about nursing home insurance. We’ll all be there soon enough.
