Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Time

       Salvador Dali's famous surrealist painting, The Persistence of Memory, shows clocks melting across an arid landscape.
      The softening pocket watches are said to depict the passage of time in dreams, or time's irrelevance.  I used to like to think the painting showed the way the pain of loss, embarrassment and cruelties of the past fade with the haze of distance, allowing us to look back without hurt.  The work was titled The Persistence of Memory, after all.
       Now I recognize the distortion aspect better. When we are young, time stretches before us, endlessly.  Christmas or that trip to Disneyland may only be a week away, but the moment takes eons to arrive.  As we age, time flips by. A year zips past with the speed of a dragonfly.
       After a spate in which I had lots of time on my hands, I will return to work--and have none. During the last months, time melted and dripped all over the place, and still,  there was quite often never enough of it. Procrastination became a fine art, a piece of work worthy of a frame in the Museum of Modern Art. And then...it was gone.
       Now, instead of dripping from rocks and barren trees, time will be gobbled by PacMan.
        I gave myself a week to prepare. That's half gone already and the rest of the week is filled with engagements and commitments that will not allow me to loaf around, finishing up things I wanted to do. Or just wrapping my ahead around the  concept of having to set the alarm clock each day.
      Years later, after the dropping of the first atomic bomb, Dali revisited his theme in The Disintegration of Persistence of Memory, exploding the barren landscape along with the melting watches.
             Time doesn't really explode, though. It doesn't march on. It melts, no matter how much or how little we have of it.
  

12 comments:

Espahan said...

Scrit, Interesting take on Dali's painting. I absolutly agree with you that time melts, it also drips much to fast the older we get.

Taryn Kincaid said...

So true. Thanks for stopping by, Marcella. I love the name of your blog.

(Why isn't there anything in it??)

Liz said...

hi TeRRi
good luck with the job

Taryn Kincaid said...

Thanks, Liz. (Twice!)

Espahan said...

Terri,

You have to click the second link. I'm afraid I haven't posted anything for several years now.

Wendy S Marcus said...

Hi Terri!
Good luck with the job! I think you'll find a way to get everything done after you get back to the daily grind. I find I'm most productive and less likely to procrastinate when I'm crazy busy.

Taryn Kincaid said...

Marcella:

Post something. Your garden pictures are gorgeous!

Taryn Kincaid said...

Wendy:

Thanks. I'm pretty sure I'll be mentally drained by the time I get home. We'll see. Trying to squeeze a lot of stuff into my remaining free time. Not too successfully so far!

Taryn Kincaid said...

My new employer just called to find out if I was available for an assignment tomorrow morning. Uh, no. But I'm glad to see they need me so badly. I guess.
And so it begins...

Janet Lane Walters said...

Isn't it wonderful to be needed.

Anonymous said...

I wake up in the morning and think, "This is a plus." My time doesn't melt or rush by. No. I relish every moment as I do the dance of life practiced when my first husband died. One step forward, another step forward, maybe a slide back but I always try to go forward. Now, twenty years later, I'm full steam ahead.

Your blog is fascinating, Terri. Thanks for dropping by mine.

http://AuthorCharmaineGordon.xanga.com

Taryn Kincaid said...

Janet: Yes. And...no.

Charmaine: Good to see you.

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