Floss your teeth for five minutes? Is that before or after the 45-minute daily meditation?

Iwas reaching the end of an appointment with my new dentist, a charming Italian – a Venetian, he told me – who has been gazing into mouths in these parts for a few decades now.

All was well. My teeth were in pretty good nick, the X-rays were good, oral hygiene fine, but some evidence of receding gums because of my toothbrushing technique. He recommended an electric model, for a gentle circular action.

He was then on a roll explaining what my bedtime toothbrushing routine should entail. I should carefully brush all teeth, forwardfacing and behind, to the front and round the back, of course, but this should be preceded by flossing. Flossing is just as important as brushing, if not more so. And one should also use those little interdental heads, reaching the parts more assuredly, no doubt, than that thin and white minty string.

“OK,” I gurgled, mouth still holding that mini vacuuming tube as he had a final gander with his little mirror. “And how long should this take?”

“Oh,” he replied breezily, “about five or six minutes.” At which point I spluttered something even I couldn’t understand and suddenly fell out of love with this wretched Italian.

Five or six minutes? As if I live such a bacchanalian life that I can devote a whole five minutes to brushing my teeth each evening. So this five minutes malarkey can go and jump in the lake with all the other minutey entreatments levelled in my direction. A three-minute meditation reset (as the precursor to a full 45-minute daily transcendental ritual) and 10 minutes of stretching. An osteopath suggested recently that each morning when I wake up I pull my knees to my chest and do some gentle rocking, to warm and stretch the spine and lower back.

This is how the day starts in our house: the alarm goes at 6.25am. We ignore it. Then it goes again at 6.30am, at which point I drag myself out of bed, put on my djellaba, run the bath for my wife, open the curtains, take the dog out, return, get the two small kids up, brush their teeth, wash their faces, and then I hand over. I bathe, Emily starts breakfast and (obviously) does last night’s homework. As I come downstairs, we hunt for shoes and schoolbags, wrestle with school ties, head for the car but, upon forgetting the kids’ water bottles, realise they are dressed wrongly, because it’s gym day, ignore it – and the children’s protestations that they are incorrectly dressed – and if Emily is driving, they leave and I head for my study to start work.

Not much room for mindfulness, stretching or meditation in that dire routine. But on four or five mornings a week I actually sneak to my study and jump on the Peloton for 30 minutes. I do it knowing that Emily is in the car and dreaming that she could be hitting a tennis ball and so I feel a bit guilty; that I’m skiving almost.

Then, as my ride ends, the instructor suggests I do an on-demand post-ride cool-down cycle. They are all at it, you see. All the health practitioners and wellbeing gurus and fitness experts, all convinced that our days can be filled with these extra little five-minute bursts of energy and love and self-love and reawakening and reforming.

It’s bad enough as it is. My life is an endless timetable of clock-checking stress. This is partly self-inflicted. While I think I would make a fabulous dictator or emperor – from the comfort of a large throne, dispatching impossible orders at all times of the day – the opportunity has yet arisen for me to rise to that challenge. So I’m a scribbler with endless deadlines. Book deadlines of a year’s hence loom like ugly trolls whose proportions and terror increase the closer they get.

And then the daily deadlines create an endless cycle of tension and relief.

A psychotherapist told me once I was an adrenalin junkie, and I certainly get bored easily, so perhaps this is the best life for me. But when I’m not bashing the keys, every other ingredient in life has a deadline: the school run, train times, car journey times, appointments with friends, meetings, restaurant bookings, events I’m planning, lunch parties we’re hosting, shopping trips, dog walks, stuff that needs watching on telly. Everything comes with a time limit and deadline.

I suspect I’m not alone in engaging in this frenetic, nerve-jangling existence.

My father once told me the story of an African leader who was invited to a heads of state meeting in London. At the Buckingham Palace banquet, he was seated next to the late Queen but he failed to show. Frantic calls were made to his people who replied that “His Excellency thanks Her Majesty for her kind invitation to dinner but he regrets he’s not hungry.”

It may not be true but I like his style. Back from my cultural exchange and when my esteemed editor emails to

My life is an endless timetable of clockchecking stress. This is partly self-inflicted

demand 1,200 words on “Isn’t it time we started mowing again?” I can say “Yeah man, maybe next week.”

I’m not sure that will quite pay the bills. Meanwhile, time’s up. The word count is reached. I’ve got 20 minutes to walk Cyrus (20 minutes exactly to listen to a new edition of Jim Thayer’s brilliant novel-writing podcast), then start the next piece and be done by 6.15pm, ready for the kids’ bath time. Which makes me wonder: while listening to Jim and walking Cyrus, could I floss?