Time Passage

I have a strange fascination with how quickly time passes. Maybe it's no different from every other adult, for I believe virtually every adult has observed how quickly time flies, and how it never ceases to amaze us how it does.

But I think I take my observation a step or too further in that my thoughts are often consumed with the concept (at least once per day). I make it much more complicated than simply noticing that time flies.

Like when I realized I was at my company for my second stint longer than I had been away after my first stint, a total of seven years. The second seven went by much more quickly. (I'm about four years into another seven.)

Or just in noticing, like I'm sure many do, how much more quickly the next high school class reunion seems to come up.

Or this: My 14-year-old son has taken a strong liking to '80s rock bands, some of whom I have seen live. We were talking about possibly going to see either AC/DC, whom I saw in 1983, or Motley Crue, whom I saw in 1984. (Neither were ever my favorites; I mainly wanted the concert t-shirts to impress girls. No, it didn't work one bit.)

So my son wants to see bands I saw 25 years ago. Aside from thinking how cool that is, and how it doesn't seem like 25 years, I couldn't get over how interesting it was (to me), that my first concert was Elvis Presley. Interesting not because it's a pretty cool story to tell (that my first concert ever was the King), but that I saw him in 1973, a mere 18 years after he broke through in American culture.

He was the king, he seemed so ancient, he was the guy my really old parents listened to in the olden days. And yet those olden days were no more than 18 years prior. Now my son wants to see a band I saw over 25 years ago. And that I first listened to even longer ago. And yet he wants to see these old farts not because they are legends, but because their music is still as good and fresh to him now as any other contemporary bands.

No, this is much more than noticing that time flies; this is dwelling on all of the weird nuances of time passing, and making strange comparisons of time passing in different time periods and blah blah blah.

I guess my son's love of '80s rock makes sense when I think about how, when other kids were listening to AC/DC when I was in high school in the '80s, I was into the Beatles, whom my folks never got into. The apple hasn't fallen to far here.

Anyway, I doubt this phenomenon is unique to many others. But I would guess I'm in small company among those who can spend an hour or two just thinking about it, usually while I'm driving or watching a ball game.

One good thing about being my age is that I think that maybe, just maybe, the increase in speed at which time seems to pass is stalling. That is, the last, say, four years, didn't seem to go much faster than the previous four. I'll let you know what I think in my blog entry on this day in 2012.