Saving time

 

Saving time

In common with many people, I save time. Waiting for the kettle to boil for morning tea (not mine, I don’t drink tea or coffee) I save time by stacking or emptying the dishwasher, filling or emptying the washing machine, cleaning the kitchen sink. It’s satisfying to know that I haven’t wasted time.  

What happens to the time I save? Is it stored somewhere safe to be used on another day when time is running short? Why can I never access this precious stash of time when I really need to, when visitors are coming and I’m never going to be ready in time, no matter how long I have allowed myself to complete various tasks?

Where does the time go? Perhaps it sneaks off to someone else’s life. You know the sort of person I mean – the one who’s always prepared for every eventuality, who sometimes complains of having time on his or her hands or boasts, rather unkindly, of having all the time in the world.

 I save so much time that I should have plenty left over, yet there are never enough hours in the day.

 Then again, a verse by W.H. Davies (1871-1940) comes to mind and gives me pause.

 

Leisure

 

What is this life, if full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

 

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows.

 

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

 

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

 

No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

 

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

 

A poor life this if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare. 

 

April A to Z blogging challenge The Thief of Time

The Thief of Time

Steals my days

And makes me indolent.

Time marches on

Relentlessly -

I watch it go.

Those moments gone

Will not return

But still I dream.

To stand and stare

Is Life’s rich gift –

There’s always time.

What’s the time, Mr Wolf?

Perhaps you enjoyed this playground game when you were six or seven years old? It was a safe way to experience a frisson of danger and panic and an outlet for the demons that sometimes haunted childhood dreams. It maligned wolves but the knowledge of a wolf's true nature would come later in life, when innocent games would be replaced with more earnest pursuits. One child would volunteer or be chosen to be Mr Wolf. He would walk a little way off and turn his back on the rest of the group. Then the game could begin. The children would begin the sing-song chant.

'What's the time, Mr Wolf?'

After each question Mr Wolf would turn to answer them and the children would take a number of steps according to the time called out. Some children would take tiny steps, pretending fear, while others would show their 'courage' with huge strides.

'One o'clock.'

'What's the time, Mr Wolf?'

'Two o'clock.'

'What's the time, Mr Wolf?'

'Five o'clock.'

'What's the time, Mr Wolf?'

'DINNER TIME!'

At this point the children would scatter, screaming, but Mr Wolf usually managed to capture the nearest who then took his place and the ritual would start again.

Maybe the correct answer to the question is, 'It depends where you are in the Universe' for time is not constant. If you travel, for example on an aircraft, and then return you will have aged less than someone who hasn't travelled. This was proved by scientists who synchronised two atomic clocks, placing one in an aircraft and one in a stationary position. When returned the clock in the aircraft showed an earlier time than the stationary clock. (Atomic clocks are so accurate that they will lose only one second in tens of millions of years.)

So speed affects time. Gravity also has an effect. If a person could live at the top of Mount Everest the ageing process would be faster than for someone at sea level. There are some places in the universe that have incredibly high gravity. If it were possible to get inside a black hole, where gravity is so dense that nothing absorbed can ever escape, time would effectively stop. Furthermore, if one were able to inhabit a spinning black hole one would be able to view the end of the universe.

To stay forever young may be your dream while all around crumble into ruins but to do so you would have to travel phenomenally fast and the energy required would be enormous. It is not possible . . . but any space travel was unimaginable not so very long ago!