Dead_line

An expired food is certainly a pity, but would you really want one that never expires? That idea seems even more disconcerting: it mimics the form of food but refuses to fulfill the life cycle of nourishment, consumption, and decay, as its death becomes indefinitely postponed. Here, Best Before is no longer an objective but a sublime object that drives us to act. This is what Lacan calls “death drive”, or what Heidegger describes as “being-toward-death.” Death, paradoxically, becomes a form of relief. It drives us by its ultimate finality and, while generating anxiety, it simultaneously gives shape to the very meaning of our actions. Without a limit, the sense of urgency disappears, and so does the motivation to act. We are compelled to act in advance—traveling, refilling prescriptions, sending messages—constantly chasing the illusion that everything must be completed before the end.

In this framework, the drive becomes trapped at the moment of expiration, while desire is propelled by the lack present before the deadline. ¹ Hysterical desire always seeks, yet only leads to missing out, because desire delivers too little pleasure. It pursues jouissance, since desire can only be satisfied through obtaining its object, while the drive circulates endlessly around its self-designated object. ² So the question is: Are we truly responding to our genuine desires, or simply obeying the command of “don’t miss out”? Do you really want to eat the food, or are you merely trying to consume it before it expires?

The exit from this loop lies in what Lacan distinguished as two deaths—the physical death of the body and the symbolic death of the subject—and specifically, in the space between them: the Antigonean death ³ , the grace period from “best before” to actual spoilage. This is not a “living dead” state but a mode of existence that transcends the definitions imposed by symbolic order. To exist at the boundary between the Imaginary and the Symbolic is to move beyond the constraints of the Big Other. “The boundary is not where a thing ends, but where it begins to appear.” Before the best-before date, a product exists in a permanent, idealized state. After the date, the boundary shifts us from passive reliance on the label to an active perception of its essence—its color, its scent. “Too late” can only be perceived in retrospect: only when a thing begins to decay does its essence come into being. Therefore, this interval is not merely a form of punishment or a transitional state but a mode of authentic existence. By actively dwelling in this realm outside the symbolic order, while physical life has not yet ended, the individual attains a freedom that transcends symbolic definitions and allows their essence to manifest for the first time.

So, after all that philosophy, the answer is embarrassingly simple: the best time to plant a tree was ten years ago; the second best time is now.