Time Warp

 

Owen Riley, by Carla, circa 2004

The Rolling Stones were not at the top of Owen’s list of favorite bands, but they had a few songs he liked a lot.  The picture above reminds me of what he might have looked like had he been born in England about 30 years earlier, working in the British rock’n'roll scene.  Funny, this is what he looked like in 2004 in Bellingham, WA, which makes me think that time and space mean very little in the big picture.  And, further, do they even exist (time and space, that is)? 

Stephen Hawking and I went round and round on this subject when I read A Brief History of Time, many years ago now.  He, unfortunately, didn’t know that we went round and round, as he was not in my living room explaining everything to me.  Instead, my dictionary and I spent a lot of time together.  Time, that thing I was trying to figure out, would have been easier to understand with a scientific time-specific dictionary.  Merriam-Webster and I had some tough moments (small chunks of time) and great voids (think black holes, worm holes, and the abyss).

All we have to do is dress a certain way, talk a certain way, behave a certain way, and people will think we are someone we are not.  Anyone can do it.  Some people even get paid to do it.  Some people do it for self-protection from people in power, who knowing who they are, make their lives miserable.

Most of us, though, are careful to avoid being seen as other than we are.  And yet, don’t we all have a public image that is vastly different from our self-image?  Or, is that just me, and oh, everyone I know?

I’m thinking a lot about time lately.  I still don’t know much about it, except that I’m frequently late, and don’t often care.  Some folks are so intimately involved with their personal concept of time, that it can change their reactions to insignificant events, especially when someone interferes with their relationship to time.  I got no time for that.  On the other hand, I have all the time in the world for someone who wants to talk away the hours in contemplation of things like…time. 

When you see a red door and you want it painted black, do you rush to the store to buy paint, then spend time painting it?  (Nat would be at the paint store so fast, his head would spin.)  Or do you wait for time to pass, in the hope that you’ll change your mind?

“I could not foresee this thing happening to you…”

Song for the night:  Paint it, Black, Rolling Stones

http://youtube.com/watch?v=-j4XSAX7bWg

~ by Linda on November 13, 2007.