modern life

"Earlier that summer, I ran into an old poet friend I hadn't seen in over a year. I said, 'How are you, Jack?' and he said 'Busy. Busyness is endemic now, you know?'
I thought, if a seventy-year-old poet is too busy, what hope is there for me?"
....
"It's become an epidemic. People drive angrily, even through this pretty foothills country, because they're too busy to slow down and enjoy the ride. They eat the worst kind of food because they're too busy to even think about eating well, let alone take the time to do it. Even recreation has gotten loud, frantic, and competitive because no one has what you can honestly call free time anymore. Fun has become a desperate business where you have to enjoy yourself in a precious few hours or die trying."

John Gierach, "At the Grave of the Unknown Fisherman"