Tuesday, January 16, 2007

The Time eating Monster

Elton John will be 60 in March. Ringo Starr is 67, Paul Newman 82, Petula Clark 75, Twiggy is 58, Carol King, 65. Just some of the figures whom Stardust refers to in one of her recent blog posts: "Everybody's getting so old...except me! LOL!". These are singers or entertainers whom I recall I too used to sort of hero worship in my teens. These guys were young when I first got to know of them and now they’re way older than I imagined was possible for anyone to be, when I was twelve or thirteen. It’s one of those things. You wake up one morning and say to yourself, “I’m 56” And then you go “Eeeek!” Because as far as you remember, just yesterday you were 21 and waiting for life to begin. What happened to the time in between?

It’s like there’s some invisible time eating black hole engulfing us which is rapidly devouring the seconds, minutes, days and years and all you do is, look at yourself in the bathroom mirror with a puzzled grin on your face not able to figure out how and when your hair turned grey or the wrinkles started to slowly creep over your face and neck.

The time eating monster has been at work these last few months as well. I figured it is five months since I left Bombay (August 18th to be exact) and four months since I landed in Prien with a broken ankle. The question is, how did it suddenly get to be January 16th? And what happened in between? Where did the days go? Friends would initially call up and make pitying sounds on the phone. "How do you manage to make the time pass?" Don’t ask me how, it just happens. You wake up in the morning, eat breakfast, work a bit on the computer, play a bit with the baby of the family (in this case four year old Felix), read, watch a bit of TV, eat, drink wine during or after dinner, spend the evening chatting and before you know it you’re rubbing your eyes and getting ready to fall into bed. Another day is over.

Well there’s not much else to say. I’m not going to start on a philosophical treatise right now. We’re reaching the end of the day and I think I’ll just pour myself a glass of red wine. It makes the time eating monster easier to bear.

1 comment:

Stardust said...

That is true what you say that when we are 21 we think we have all this time ahead of us and it seems like we have forever, but with each passing decade, life seems to go by faster and faster and we see more and more how little time we really have on this planet. The older I get, the more I appreciate the world around me.

I wake up in the morning, and fix myself a cup of coffee and uncover my Bearded Dragon who is named Miller. Then it seems before I know it, I am covering Miller and saying goodnight to her. Then go to sleep, get up, get my coffee and uncover her...and so on, and so on. Sunrise sunset, sunrise, sunset, Swiftly flow the days, as the lyrics from Fiddler on the Roof say.

We just make the best of what time we have, have a glass of wine as you say, and enjoy it.