Marcel Winatschek

You Won’t Make It Three Minutes

The internet has converted whatever patience I had into a low-grade static. I pick up my phone during film credits. I open a new tab in the middle of reading another tab. Three paragraphs into a book I’m already checking whether the adaptation is any good. The compulsion isn’t really about content—it’s the habit of interruption itself, the itch that exists regardless of whether anything is actually there.

CollegeHumor made a video that dares you to sit still and watch it for three uninterrupted minutes. Three minutes. The length of a pop song. The time it takes to make instant coffee. I failed. I knew I’d fail. The test isn’t really about the video—it’s a mirror with a timer attached, and the mirror is unkind. Oh, a cat.