The Problem with Puttering

The Problem with Puttering. No, I don't mean "punting," which refers to football, or "putting," which refers to golf. I mean "puttering," which means "doing a number of small tasks or not concentrating on anything particular." It's the latter part of the definition that is troubling — "not concentrating on anything particular." I recall seeing grandparents of my day (and I am a grandparent now) shuffling around, tinkering with insignificant things, puttering. Isn't that what age does to a person and their goals and life? It should not and need not be so.

I am reading an interesting and challenging chapter in Dorothy Sayers' book, Letters to A Diminished Church, in which she accuses much of Christendom with a problem of entertainment going awry. She says the danger in "amusement art" is that "it can be carried to the point where, not merely art, but the whole universe of phenomena becomes a screen on which we see the magnified projection of our unreal selves as the object of equally unreal emotions. This brings about the complete corruption of the consciousness. It is pseudo art." She says that true artists should indeed be encouraged to express their own Christian experience and communicate that to others — "That is the true artist saying: “Look! Recognize your experience in my own.” But “edifying art” may only too often be the pseudoartist corruptly saying: “This is what you are supposed to believe and feel and do."

What does this have to do with puttering? Puttering can be reduced to pseudo-activity, a substitute for real work or valid activity. We putter when we have little to nothing to do, busying ourselves with inconsequential activities that take up time and some effort but accomplish little to nothing in particular.

I can hear the objections now. We have been too busy in our day to day work lives, many say,  and retirement is the time to do nothing, or to putter around. Thankfully, many retirees are actively exercising, working and doing second and third careers. But there are those "putterers" who end up shuffling around and doing little to nothing. The danger is not merely a reduction in physical and mental and emotional health, if that were not enough, but a disregard to what the Creator made us to be and do until the end of our days.

People will note that age means slowing down, and illnesses and real physical and mental problems plague many. I acknowledge these realities and perhaps "puttering" is all they can really do with their time and remaining energies. I would caution us, however, that we are to be busy about the work God gives us at every stage of life and thought, and make adequate action goals to accomplish what He has in store for us. We all have a calling from God to live a life well. Not to putter around senselessly and aimlessly.

So, at whatever age you are, especially if you are retired from the work force, what are your goals for this year, this month, this week, this day? What will you do to fulfill your calling from God your Creator and, if a Christian, your Redeemer? Puttering is akin to laziness and laziness is condemned in Scripture and really in most societies.