Rush Hours - Examining the Busy Life - NYTimes.com In "The "Busy" Trap" (Anxiety series, Sunday Review, July 1), Tim Kreider views busyness through a negative lens, regarding it as a self-imposed life force to which we are addicted, an existential rationalization against life's emptiness. But this negates the beauty of busyness. It elides its elegance. Busyness is not a hedge against life's meaninglessness, as Mr. Kreider suggests; instead, it gives life meaning. That apostle of busyness and philosopher of meaning, Albert Camus, seemed to have busyness in mind in "The Myth of Sisyphus." Camus did not regard the arduous pushing up of the rock as a defense against emptiness. Dexterously guiding the rock up the hill, after it predictably falls to the bottom, is what gives human beings their nobility. It is the quintessential struggle that defines life, fills the human heart and breathes soul and vitality into the disparate moments of a day. The writer is a professor of communication at Cleveland State University. Perhaps what motivates the "busyness" of so many Americans is not an inflated sense of self-importance, as Tim Kreider seems to suggest. More likely, the motivation is fear. We are afraid that if we don't put in our 60 hours a week, we won't survive the next round of layoffs and will be replaced, if not by the person in the next cubicle, then by someone in China or India who would gladly do our job for a fifth of the salary. We are afraid that our busy spouses will not love us if we are perceived as not pulling our weight with respect to child care and household tasks. We are afraid that our children, if left to their own devices, would spend all day playing video games or doing who-knows-what online. For me and for most of the people I know, these worries are more proximate than the fear that we will be too busy to enjoy the finer things in life. Don't even ask me how I have time to respond to this article. After all, the dry cleaning is due to be picked up, and I just realized I didn't buy basil for tonight's dinner. Did I mention that my son starts camp tomorrow and he'll need lunch? Don't get me started on the fact that another son finished his sophomore year of high school, and college is just around the corner. And the laundry - need I say more? Very busy, gotta go ...