What Time Is It Anyway?

I have been spending a good deal of the summer reading and thinking about time. The summer itself has been a study in seasonal time with its extreme weather, from dangerous heat in one area, to cold and rain in another. Where I live in upstate New York, we experienced three out of four seasons in the course of a few days: summer heatwave, torrential spring rains, and cool, brisk autumn breezes. After living here for so many years, I've made it a habit of keeping out a few items of clothing to cover all extremes ... yes, I have sweatshirts and sweatpants hanging next to my shorts in the closet!

My understanding of actual time has also been on my mind lately. Surely this last year and a half or so has put the subject of time front and center for all of us, especially if we had to spend the majority of our time indoors. Between surgeries and the pandemic, I spent so much time inside that I would have lost it completely if it hadn't been for focusing my attention on my tiny, tabletop garden, and writing. My garden not only kept me in the moment as I tended to it, but kept me on track with the seasons. Mother Nature has a way of doing that for us when we lose all track of time. I spent the winter making plans for the garden, spent the spring starting to plant and rearranging the garden, and now in the summer I am watching my herbs grow tall, even having to harvest some already to keep them from getting out of hand. Now, in the early mornings, I am starting to feel those first stirs of autumn even though the calendar says we have several weeks yet before we should even be thinking about it. With Climate Change front and center these days, those hot, steamy, dog days of August may still show up, but the cooler mornings and the first, tiny bits of color on the very tips of some of the leaves are telling me a different story.

Time is an concept. "To everything there is a time and a season," scripture tells us. For some of us who have full to-do lists, time flies. For others that no longer go to jobs or have children at home, time lays heavy on their hands. The one thing I've learned these past few months as I've been studying time is this: the only time I need to worry about is the moment I'm in. This very moment I'm in right now is precious and is where my power lies. What will I do with it? Even using it to sit and watch two blue jays soaring across the sky while having a shouting match is precious and powerful. So is using it to write this blog post. I don't need a calendar to tell my body and soul what season it is, nor do I need a clock to tell me when to eat and when to go to bed. Mother Nature took care of all that when she set up the whole sunrise/sunset circadian rhythms system, as well as the seasons that come and go when they will. All I need to do is stay present, stay mindful, and keep a few pieces of all-season clothes handy. Mother Nature will take care of the rest.

And so it is.