I hope this will be the last post about Facebook. I can't get over it's people locating abilities. I found people that I haven't talked to for 20 years! There was a time when I could say I haven't even been around that long--in three months I'll be forty. I'm not sure how old my perception is now. For a long time, at least until I was 25, I perceived myself to be 18, and then the perception changed because I felt as if people were actually listening to me. So I think I "felt" 28 for some length of time, but since then. . . .
In geological time, I ain't nothin', but in human marking of time 40 is a collective chunk of something. Seeing how so many people have aged isn't a memento mori, but it sure is a quake to my sensibilities. Where does that time go? No, I don't think it has sped by as too many people fall into the cliched habit of saying and experiencing. Time just moves at the same pace for me--sometimes to fast, sometimes too slow, but never always one or the other--mostly just whatever the chronological speed limit is.
I think two things have helped time pass in a steady manner for me--noticing the seasonal changes around me and following the liturgical calendar. Both help me focus intensely and allow time to just ontologically wash past me. Right now it's winter and (depending on how you count it) either Epiphany or a short round of Ordinary time. Outside the air is sharp, the neighborhood is quieter, except for the days lots of kids are sledding at Lola Valley. Only a few species of birds visit, squirrels the only wild mammals visible. Occasionally a hawk perches in the naked trees. The snow hides the anticipation of green explosions. Now we celebrate the baptism of Jesus or we wait for the desert time of Lent. Anything else is just mindless busyness.
Wendell Berry said "To see and respect what is there is the first duty of stewardship." He was talking about ecosystems, but I think he'd agree with me that time falls under that duty. To let 20 years pass by without reflection, care, notice is simply bestial. I'm sorry I lost contact with those people. But I'm glad I found them again. O happy time machine!
In geological time, I ain't nothin', but in human marking of time 40 is a collective chunk of something. Seeing how so many people have aged isn't a memento mori, but it sure is a quake to my sensibilities. Where does that time go? No, I don't think it has sped by as too many people fall into the cliched habit of saying and experiencing. Time just moves at the same pace for me--sometimes to fast, sometimes too slow, but never always one or the other--mostly just whatever the chronological speed limit is.
I think two things have helped time pass in a steady manner for me--noticing the seasonal changes around me and following the liturgical calendar. Both help me focus intensely and allow time to just ontologically wash past me. Right now it's winter and (depending on how you count it) either Epiphany or a short round of Ordinary time. Outside the air is sharp, the neighborhood is quieter, except for the days lots of kids are sledding at Lola Valley. Only a few species of birds visit, squirrels the only wild mammals visible. Occasionally a hawk perches in the naked trees. The snow hides the anticipation of green explosions. Now we celebrate the baptism of Jesus or we wait for the desert time of Lent. Anything else is just mindless busyness.
Wendell Berry said "To see and respect what is there is the first duty of stewardship." He was talking about ecosystems, but I think he'd agree with me that time falls under that duty. To let 20 years pass by without reflection, care, notice is simply bestial. I'm sorry I lost contact with those people. But I'm glad I found them again. O happy time machine!
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