Lindy Whitton Studio

Time is such an elastic concept. Long , lazy hours by the pool napping in the sun and the afternoon stretches on in a slow, golden haze. Add an un-put-downable book and the time flys, I look up as the light fades to find the Formula 1 Novel Effect has kicked in and 4 hours have raced by in a blur of gripping plot twists and scintillating dialogue.

Then there’s the Simultaneous Paradox .Caught in a traffic jam on the motorway to the Charles de Gaulle airport with 2 hours till our flight departs and the flashing red signs screaming that there’s a 1 hour expected delay! The traffic crawls along at a speed barely faster than a stationary object ( at one point I’m sure the holm oak forest overtook our car!). The minutes drag on and on as our car becomes mired down in the morass of bumper to bumper cars, trucks and buses. At the same time every second  whirls past faster and faster exponentially increasing momentum as the time to departure grows closer and closer.

The Slow Motion Seconds that feel like a life time as the car I’m driving hits black ice and turns 360 degrees before running off the road and coming to rest against a tree just metres from a swift running river. The euphoric moment of realisation that we’re safe is instantaneous yet stays with me all day.

Deadline Time is like no other! I well remember my swot vac before matric exams.Time spiralled in on itself as the exam date loomed ever closer and the revision schedule blew out due to ice cream overload and a complete inability to concentrate on anything other than trashy novels!

My Time of Discontent is fixed and immovable as I rail against whatever it is I’m railing against at the moment. Perhaps it’s the thought of yet another year of stress inducing working life. Maybe I want my cake and eat it too – and then hate the scales for reflecting the sad reality that results from having my cake and eating it in such large amounts! It could simply be the grey day that makes time seem so stagnant. Give me sunshine and the hours find wings.

My LIFE clock is not like the mantle clock that tics and tocs away the minutes and hours to a regular beat. I remember watching my boys sleeping as babies. Their perfect, peaceful breathing, the miracle of their being, the just fed , milky smiles and time just stood still in those moments of wonder. Then  somehow as they grew time sped up and their little lives just flew past in a whirl of toddler activity , school drop offs and pick ups, playdates, sleepovers, holidays , birthdays , Christmas excitement and  teenage angst. Their twenties saw a slowing down as they embarked on longer term projects and we’ll see what happens as they set off on new paths in the future.

There are never enough hours for the joys and pleasures of life yet endless days and months and years for the sorrows. I need to take control of that elastic band of time. I need to stretch it out to encompass all that is beautiful, rich , rewarding and full of hope. I will let it slacken off so that some of the disappointments , losses, hurts and plain old boredoms just drop right out the bottom of time!