Where does the time go? How can it be the end of the month already? Didn’t October just begin? Why does life move at such breakneck speed as we get older?
Margaret Mitchell called her book Gone With the Wind. Maybe that is where the time went.
At the end of The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Au contraire, F. Scott, I find that I’m being borne forward ceaselessly into the future.
I wouldn’t have it any other way. But my vehicle seems to be moving faster than ever before. The telephone poles fly past my window with ever-increasing speed and the trip is nearly over. The destination is just around the next bend. It will be here before I know it.
I want to stay a little longer. I want to enjoy the autumn leaves, the smell of the sea, the grandeur of the mountains, the laughter of children, the embrace of a lover.
I don’t want it to end. But it must. It will.
Today I am beating against the current. Tomorrow is Halloween. Tomorrow night Daylight Saving Time ends in the United States. In what is a total illusion, we will all turn our clocks back and “gain and hour.”
No, we won’t.
November 1st is All Saints Day. Thanksgiving will be here before you know it. Easter. 2025.
Time marches on. I wish I could too.
I am a Christian. I do believe that a better life awaits. So what am I trying to say exactly?
Maybe just this: “To life! To life! L’chaim!”
I don’t think this post makes any sense, but I’m going to publish it anyway.
Maybe one of you can explain it to me.
Somedays I think all of us would like life to slow down. So many things (including death) seem to be only a heartbeat away, and I would like to savour the here and now.
ReplyDeleteIt is certainly not your normal rambling because it does have rhyme and reason to it. In fact, well written because I found myself wondering if they were your words or you were still quoting F Scott Fitzgerald. A very thought provoking post Sir.
ReplyDeleteI appreciated this post. It speaks of the secret vulnerabilities that are inside all human beings. Somehow it sits very comfortably with my poem "Song for Lost Youth" that you very kindly pasted into your sidebar for others to read. We have to be brave to face up to time as we voyage through it to our final destination and I guess that as we grow older we can almost see it through the haze - just there on the horizon.
ReplyDeleteThe changing of the seasons always brings about a melancholy in me. Recent events in my own life have me thinking more about how life & times have sped past. I think it's pretty natural to be introspective as we get older and start to feel like our warranties might need to be extended. Keep posting...always a good and thought-provoking read from you!
ReplyDeleteWhat seems like aimless wandering of thought actually has a very real point. It's just different for each reader. Thank you.
ReplyDelete"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Au contraire, F. Scott, I find that I’m being borne forward ceaselessly into the future."
ReplyDeleteI can well understand and appreciate your sentiment, but I rather think that Fitzgerald was talking about our efforts to free ourselves from the constraints of our past instead of our passage through time. I never can remember how old you are, but I think you’re around 74, which would make you eight years older than I. I remember feeling the press of time when I was in my early thirties, in response to which I counted how many years I was likely to have left and taking comfort in the fact that my life was less than half over. Now, I figure that, with luck, I’ll last about two more decades. Well, I’ve lived in this house for 25 years, and it doesn’t seem like much time, which means that 20-years is close to nothing. Of course, you have the thought that another—and better—existence is awaiting you, so surely that is of some comfort, whereas I only anticipate being forever dead, sort of like when I’ve been anesthetized during surgery. I envy you your faith.
Commenters, I have been derelict in responding to your comments, but I want each and every one of you to know that I appreciate yours.
ReplyDeleteSnowbrush is of course correct about F. Scott Fitzgerald's intentions, but that didn't stop me from twisting his meaning to serve my post's purposes!
"Snowbrush is of course correct about F. Scott Fitzgerald's intentions, but that didn't stop me from twisting his meaning to serve my post's purposes!"
ReplyDeleteToo lazy to continue Googling for a fitting quotation, are we?