Why don’t I write like I’m “running out of time?”

This line from the play Hamilton has been haunting me.  It describes Alexander Hamilton, who wrote 51 of the 85 federalist papers in 6 months.  He wrote all the time. And he did run out of time, dying at age 49. Awareness of mortality can be useful for perspective and discerning priorities, but right now it's paralyzing me because every word must be valuable and every minute productive, 

My father died suddenly of a heart attack when he was 42.  On my own 42^nd birthday I realized I assumed I too had the Campbell heart and would die young.  On that birthday, I exhaled deeply and wondered what to do with the next 42 years.

I work with young people in early recovery from addictions, many of whom believed they wouldn’t live past 20 or 21.  Now that they’re sober, they face the question—what do I do with the rest of my life? It's a lifetime's practice to face the quotidian wholeheartedly.  And yet only in full presence to my daily life do I actually enjoy it.

 Does everyone feel a pull to produce something useful and lasting, or is that need met for most through children and grandchildren? Is my desire to write something helpful, meaningful and wildly popular arrogance, or evidence of a persistent dream of mine? Or is it simply the same human impulse that led our ancestors to draw on cave walls in something indelible?

Maybe I should stop writing about writing or organizing my socks (yes it's fall here and I am packing away sandals) and get to work!