20th May – Darker Path

There are those that tell you they can and have seen into the fog of future, they say that they have gained a glimpse of what is to come. Whilst whittling away the hours recently in a fantasy adventure game (not a genre I normally associate with), I came across a magical creature not human, whose perception of time past present and future was instantaneous, that is to say every moment that had ever happened was happening, and every moment to happen had already happened.

Obviously this put the poor thing under terrible stress, it being unable to make grammatically correct sentences, and constantly confusing the past,current and future tenses.

Whilst waiting myself, for whatever the time fog brings presently to me, I’ve been taking a little trip back down memory lane. I’ve been looking at photos of times gone by, and getting a good old dose of nostalgia. Previously, I always considered this feeling, indeed this thought mechanism, as being disruptive, a waste of time, and possibly even useless. Now however, I’m not so sure.

Whilst the fantasy creature cannot communicate effectively, it can communicate, and knows what it talks about. However, study a person suffering from memory loss, and you will find the opposite; the person will make sense but be clueless as to the context of its discourse. In short, whilst knowing where you’re going can make life difficult, not knowing where you’ve been would seem to make performing any kind of role, impossible.

Nature is one giant sphere. Galaxies, planets, the sun, drops of water, eggs, eyes, all spherical. They are the most successful natural formations of the three dimensions, but what about the fourth dimension and its products? Is time round, linear, spherical, is it anything? This is fringe stuff right here folks, so put your thinking caps on…

I think time does follow nature. Weather is an ever repeating cycle, if you wait long enough, the same time of day will come round again, after 60 minutes we return to the first, and look at analogue clocks (the ones with handles), round and they have been around for hundred of years. When we remember an event, we “cast” our minds back to it. We create a little loop in time, taking us back to that moment to experience it in our heads.

Unlike those that seek to profit from progress, I do look back. I look back at where I’ve been, tracing the footsteps until a more distant fog shrouds those to far to ever return, and it makes me wonder if, perhaps even hope that time is circular, but then you have to turn back forwards, and take the steps which follow an ever travelling darkness.