On the Passage of Time Part III
Clearly this is my favorite topic.
It’s also the one that terrifies me the most. On my flight to Chicago I was watching the movie “17 Again” in which the main character, a middle-aged man in the midst of a divorce, returns to his senior year of high school to do it all over again and make better choices. Or something like that. I was thinking about it today and man - I would never want to go through that part of my life AGAIN and relearn all of the lessons I had to in the first place.
And then I was thinking about how I’m about to leave Chicago and how these past two weeks have pretty much sped by amidst random activities, camp work, mini-reunions and tons of food. I also sometimes think about how its already been a few years since graduating college and just today I was relieved to know that my ten year high school reunion is still a few years away.
Just now though, I was talking to my parents about Prodigy - the first version of the internet open to the public. How crazy that just a few years ago the internet was this baby that no body really knew about or could utilize all that much. My mom chimes in and is like “yeah I remember my boss showing us this presentation when I worked at the bank. He was telling us about how you could use it to check the weather and we were amazed…now look at it.” And my dad was like, “yup, in just 20 years.” To which my mom says, “get outta here it wasn’t 20 years ago. It was in 1989! Oh….”
You can probably imagine the incredulousness of my mom when she realized that her banking days, the end of the 80’s, and the start of the internet was a whole 20 years ago.
For me, it’s not a big deal to picture 20 years ago. “God, kindergarten was 20 years ago! No way!!” Ha. More like, it’s about time for the 20 year mark - feels like it should have been 40 by now!
And that’s the scary part - I feel like at any point now, the passing of time is just going to exponentially increase. For the first time in my life, I don’t necessarily crave the next step. I’m actually okay freezing for a bit and just staying in a state of gray. (Who knew that K4’s New Year’s toast would become so fulfilled?!)
And I am terrified of the day when I will stop and say, “Holy cow that was 20 years ago?!?!” I mean that’s about to be the 90’s. Are you even ready for that?? Jeez.
Time - all I know is that if you’re going to fly, it better be first class.. Don’t make me resent a life of crappy blankets and cramped legroom that comes with economy class territory, arright?
(Dated June 23, 2009)
