Doin’ My Time

Time marches on, goes the saying. The imputation is that it is somehow something that is relentless, unchanging, doesn’t give a damn how we feel about what its passage does to us.

But it doesn’t always march, sometimes it creeps imperceptibly, glacially, as back when I had suffered a broken rib for the third time. Through past experience I knew it would feel less painful in a couple of weeks, but right then it hurt when I moved, when I laughed, when I coughed … when I breathed.

And then there are times when it simply hurtles. There was a day in summer on a rural highway in western Nebraska when I wound my motorcycle up to its limit, which turned out to be 116 mph. I glanced down at the highway below my feet and saw a complete blur that (sensibly) freaked me out and I slowed to a more reasonable rate of travel. That was how this past summer flew by.

I bent over the raised bed to plant a tomato in June and when I straightened up it was September. By the time I had absorbed this fact it was the end of November. That, my friends, is life winding up the motorbike for me, without my touching the throttle. No matter how rational I am on my good days – no matter how much I accept the natural order of being born, of living a life, and then passing away – there are moments when I look down below my feet and see the blur and feel a twinge.

That happened last night just before I fell asleep. Our elder cat, Poco, joins us when we read in bed. After we turn out the light he takes off for his preferred sleeping place, wherever that is. I was looking at him, at his scruffy fur, his thinness, his irregular breathing, and remembering the sleek and powerful creature that he had been and now he was at the point where I was checking on his breathing.

At that moment, I was feeling rather scruffy myself. And I know that Robin checks my breathing occasionally. I thought … hmmmm … this is what amigos do for one another. I smiled to myself, rolled over, and went to sleep.

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Since I am on the subject of time, I thought I’d bring in the observations of some of the great philosophers to give us their take. They are much more interesting than my own. Some of them you can even dance to.

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The only reason for time is so that everything doesn’t happen at once.

Albert Einstein

I went to a restaurant that serves ‘breakfast at any time’. So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.

Steven Wright

Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.

Henry David Thoreau

Time is the wisest counselor of all.

Pericles

Time is bunk.

Douglas Adams

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Heading into winter with a fraction of an inch of snow on the ground and the chill is definitely in the air. Winter here in Paradise is never a hardship, not really. Not for an old Minnesota boy and a South Dakota girl. We’ve been here a decade now and the worst thing that Winter has thrown at us is to close the mountain passes once in a while. But since we’ve really scaled back on even thinking about traveling in the sketchy-road season … even that is not much of an inconvenience.

In South Dakota there was always less certainty. You’d read the weather report suggesting that a frozen calamity was en route to where you were or wanted to go while you looked out the window at a sunny day. And you’d take that chance. And sometimes … sometimes … this attitude and practice left you spending the night in the Bide-A-Wee Motel in Last Chance SD, population 12. Watching the wallpaper peel, listening to the bathroom faucet drip, and being glad to be anywhere with the blizzard on the outside and you within. What a difference a door makes.

There was that one day that I still don’t understand completely. We started out from Minneapolis on a return trip to Yankton SD. The air temperature was minus 15 degrees Fahrenheit. We were maybe one hour into the trip when it started to rain. Rain! How does that even happen when it’s 15 degrees below zero?

Everything, the car, the highway, the trees, became instant ice. All of the cars had to pull over to the shoulder because there was no way that defrosters could clear the windshield under those conditions. And, of course, even if you could see ahead, the road was an ice rink. Days like that it’s good to have enough gas in the tank to run the engine and keep you warm until travel is once again possible. (Update: Or enough juice in the battery for EV drivers)

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