TIMES

Anytime you need an extra hour remember you can do it; no one will care.

Tell your boss, the teachers at your school, dentist–whomever–TIME CHANGE! It depends, as Einstein said, and hours are anyway makebelieve.

Even sunrise and sunset are most precarious, depending as they do on balance, the fine rim of universal turn.

For the days to be long, for time to pass slow, there must be markers of excitement, but

why would I want a comet to fall, anything but this graceful swing around the sun, this easy similarity of days?

How the Magical Thinking works: You notice that all is ordinary, and you’re thankful.

You’re asking for trouble; now things will fall apart. This is no mere superstition.

It doesn’t matter what you think. Troubles come whether you will or not. It’s how evolution happens: adaptation to stress, the tiny advantage in your genes.

I have stopped handing mine along; trouble is no longer my necesssity. But the times don’t listen; still the auspicious hours arrive, still they pass.

Listen, time passes. Listen? Touch it–the texture like tight wound wool, rows of pattern knit in color, yarn around the fingers, needle click.

Smell it pass– the coffee brewed again, yeast to bread to toast.

Can you taste it– time–flavored like wrinkled apples, new maple syrup, the cherry lollipops you coveted way back, when you were a kid.

Hindus have a Day of Paint. Children learn early to paint themselves first, with water color, before someone else does it in color that will remain till the skin wears away.

Though we might not suspect it, we are never groundless, here. We have all the dust of time solid beneath our feet.