by Kat | Nov 25, 2024 | General, Words
We may try to think of you, Time,
but you, Time, think of yourself continually,
without need of imagination, assistance, or witness.
— Jane Hirshfield, an excerpt of her poem Time Thinks of Time*
Time was a thief this month… or perhaps it was its typical selfish-self… as the minutes, hours, days, and weeks raced past.
I have spent as much of my time as I could, settled into Time… the book… and when reading was not possible, I listened and re-listened to some of the essays read by the authors here. (You will find Jane reading her poem, Time Thinks of Time in the list… and it is so very worth the listen!)
What a perfect serendipitous gift this issue was… and it has made me think and rethink my thoughts on time. Perhaps it is just being at this point in my life, closer to the end than to the beginning, that the focus on time has bubbled to the surface of my thinking. But I had so many things that tipped me towards this word last year… far too many to be a coincidence. I think perhaps that some other force gently nudged me into thinking about time. I am so glad I followed the nudges because it has been a magnificent year of learning! It makes me a little sad to turn the calendar from November to December in a few short days, ushering in my last month with this word.
Except… it won’t really be the end, will it? Time being a constant… at least as we know it in our days. Or is there a way to change our perception of time. As Ms. Hirshfield so brilliantly reminds me in her poem, “What might be different, could we interrupt you?”
And so, this month, I set out to discover ways to do just that… interrupt time. I’d like to say that I found an abundance of things, but sadly that is not true… there was not enough time… but the thing that topped the list turns out to be the best interrupter ever created! That is, of course, wee Franklin. He is the Master Time Disrupter! But then, he is currently the Master Disrupter of All Things!
Master Disrupter of All Days wondering if there will be a second brekkie today…pretty please?!
But despite his disruptions this month I was reminded that the simple act of knitting a row or two is an excellent pause on racing time… that and a quietly napping pup!
I shall continue to contemplate ways of interrupting time… and perhaps the act of contemplating is the first (and best?) interrupter of time!
As always, I am so thankful that Carolyn provides a space for us to share each month. Way back when I started having a word focus, I had much to learn… and staying focused was not easy! Carolyn helped cement this practice for me by providing a reminder and a space to share. I cannot thank her enough for all that she has given to me!
Stop by and see how others fared with their words this month!
*Time thinks of Time by Jane Hirshfield published in Emergence Magazine, Volume 5: Time.
Header photo by Skitterphoto
by Kat | Oct 28, 2024 | General, Words
October has always been my favorite month. I love the weather… it eases back and forth between summer and autumn. The sun is at the most glorious angle and it lights up everything with the most beautiful glow. And even if there is a grey day, the trees provide the most beautiful light!
So this month I tried my best to practice keeping time versus time keeping me. Or maybe in better words… being a conductor of what is happening versus a recorder of what has happened. Although, sometimes being the latter is crucial to a day, I don’t want to be focused on making sure I record everything. I much prefer to look at a day and the time allowed to it use it as best I can.
As the month draws to a close, I am so grateful for 10 days in Erie… Presque Isle helps me find that vertical time sweet spot… and that makes the days feel like they stretch on forever.
And last Friday, when we brought wee Franklin home, a new kind of time started… the time of new beginnings! And so since then I have been immersed in that time. New beginning time is … time consuming and exhausting and at times hilarious. Franklin has two speeds currently…. fast as f**k and sound asleep. I have spent more time on the floor in the past 3 days than I do in a month! (Yay for all that getting up and sitting down!!) I have been trying to be a precise time keeper each night, making some observations on the day… but that exhaustion thing is very real. My preference is to write things down manually, but I have been cheating with some electronic notes on my phone… I will eventually get them onto paper, but for now it is a quick way to remember things!
Speed: passed out.
And so… as I try and savor every last moment of October, I am happy that I had a good chunk of the month where I excelled at keeping time… it makes these ending days of just focusing on making sure I am a good time keeper not a bad thing at all!
Ten months in and my delight with Time has not waned! I am eager for these last two months to show me new things about Time!
Again, a huge thanks to Carolyn for providing a place for us to all gather together and share our progress!
I will hopefully be back on Wednesday with some unraveling (I am not sure about any actual knitting, but I promise to have more photos of wee Franklin!)
Header photo by Cats Coming
by Kat | Sep 30, 2024 | General, Words
Time is the fire in which we burn. — Gene Roddenberry
I have reached the portion of the year that feels like I am racing against time. The days are growing ever shorter… both in the hours of daylight and what time I might have left to me. How appropriate that the seasonal changes are reminding me clearly that I am well into the autumn of my days.
This is not exactly a bad thing… or at least that is what I tell myself as I get up with the familiar aches and pains of my life. Those morning moments as I try to “get myself all working again” are the most humbling ones of my day.
I have spent this month contemplating what I want to accomplish yet this year in my study of time. Nine months in and I still am learning new things about time… or I am still learning new things about myself. I believe both things are true… and that is wildly invigorating! Learning is life!
I read a very interesting little book this month… Carlo Rovelli’s The Order of Time. When I first finished it, I thought… well, there’s not much here. But I am rethinking my initial thoughts on that little book… it is one I have not stopped thinking about. Most especially Rovelli’s thoughts on memory… he likens memory to time, or rather, that our memories are time.
This is time for us. Memory. A nostalgia. — Carlo Rovelli
Think you haven’t used your time wisely? Dip into the well of your memories and see just how perfectly you have used it.
I have spent lots of time in my memory well and have added pages chapters to the memory journal I am making for my kids. And in these moments, I find that time is not burning… rather I have found another point of Jenny Odell’s “vertical time” … where the passing of time stands still.
And that, dear friends, is a very good distraction from the feeling of trying to stay ahead of those flames devouring the minutes of my day!
As always, I am so grateful for Carolyn gathering us all together to share our progress each month.
Happy Monday everyone, I will see you all back here on Wednesday!
Photo by Eugene Shelestov
by Kat | Aug 26, 2024 | General, Words
I thought we were having an earthquake when the Enterprise August hit Warp speed. — Robert Bryndza
I hope you will allow me a bit of a tweak in the line from Mr. Bryndza’s The Not So Secret Emails of Coco Pinchard! Like the Enterprise looked when Captain Kirk asked Scotty for Warp speed is how August felt to me… here and (almost) gone in a brief second. And I am both thankful and sad that it has felt so.
So very thankful that time has not dragged… and unbelievably sad that this month has just raced by.
I have spent much of my time this month dabbling… Doing bits of this and that. A bit of stitching here, a bit of painting there, a few rows knit here, more rows ripped out there. The days and my dabbling feeling a bit like an hour glass… turning over when all the sand has fallen to begin the process again.
I have also been reading thoughts about time. Mostly, reading and rereading Layli Long Soldier’s An Essay of (K)nots and Footnotes. Like all of her writing, it takes me time to settle in and begin to “get it”… but once I do… well, those feelings are the reason I keep reading and rereading! She makes me just the tiniest bit wiser.
This is how time works. A tapestry of interconnectivity. Pull on a loose thread, and find it woven through to the first (k)not. — Layli Long Soldier
As a “fidgeter” I am one to pull those loose threads… and, as inner perfectionist me is wont to do… quickly tie on a new thread and keep moving forward.
However, this month has helped me see that it is wiser to just leave the loose thread visible… knowing it is an important part of life… a visible reminder of when one thing ended. Then comes the hope of waiting for a new thread to begin and allowing myself the time to live in the in-between.
As always, I am so very thankful to Carolyn for providing us the space and encouragement each month to share our word work. Please stop and see how others have journeyed this month.
See you all back here on Wednesday!
Header photo by Jordan Benton
by Kat | Jun 24, 2024 | General, Welcome
Time moved in two directions because every step into the future carried a memory of the past… — Paul Auster, 4 3 2 1
I have mostly ignored Ali Edwards this year and in past years, I don’t think I have paid much attention to the “companion word” lesson. But time just seemed the perfect word for companions… it seems to invite them.
- I thought about time and space… such perfect companions.
- And then there is the juncture of time… an intersection, as it were, of things happening. Perhaps an ending and a beginning.
- Then there is the time of music… rhythm and all the delight it brings to my day!
- And how about set time… the scheduled time of our lives. Not much fun here… but it is perhaps the most necessary sort of time!
- At 63 I am most familiar with the keeping of time in years, months, weeks, days… I remember time dragging when I was young, but my thoughts on this being the final Monday in June surprised me… this month just raced by!
- Finally… when you add all these things together, I have my life experience… the collection of minutes, days, weeks, months, years… all of which are memories of the past… lots of memories to carry with me into the future!
I have been thinking about those memories a lot this month as I contemplated companions of time… and so I would add another companion to time… memory. In my “memory thinking,” I thought about how my grandparents shared memories… vivid memories… every time I visited them. I need to keep those memories… so I am going to begin a bit of a memory journal, where I can write down the stories that were shared with me. That way, their memories can live on past them… and past me.
Added to all of that is my reread of Paul Auster’s 4 3 2 1 and my month has been full of time contemplation! I don’t think I really tuned in to all the fascinating time references that Auster shares in the lives of Ferguson… but this time, with time on my radar, I am finding so much to contemplate, to consider, to change my view. I think that my reread of 4 3 2 1 was a timely intervention by the OLW gods!
…and while all people are bound together by the common space they shared, their journeys through time were all different, which meant that each person lived a slightly different world from everyone else. — Paul Auster, 4 3 2 1
I love this thought… though we are all in the same “time frame” we all have very different journeys. A gentle reminder for kindness, empathy, and openness to those who cross our paths… I need this reminder more often than I’d care to admit!
And there you have my collection of thoughts on time this month… (and for those keeping track, this month a word began showing up on my radar all over the place! I am thinking… potential OLW ’25?? And while I am excited by this, I know the journey to December still has many days to go, but I think this could prove to be a fascinating word to study!)
I would like to thank Carolyn for her timely reminders on our OLW updates because I really needed that reminder this month! Stop over there and see how everyone else did on their word journeys!
See you all back here on Wednesday with some Unraveling!
