Larger than Life

Who am I? You have probably never seen me, and it is unlikely that you ever will. You may know my name. Or maybe not. I am just another thing, rattling around in a Universe of things.

You could be wandering down a beautiful country track on a fine summer’s day, with infant birds chirping in the trees. The sun is shining its warm, healing rays down on your face and you feel embraced and at peace.

Then, you see me in the distance. A friendly image walking towards you. You close your eyes for a brief instant, enjoying the warmth of the moment. Blinking-open your eyes, to take in the scene …

But time has passed, and I am gone. Unheralded, ungreeted and unfulfilled.

Alone once more in a busy, hectic, even frantic World. Supposedly, an ecosystem of interrelated organisms, where everyone and everything is reliant on each other. A Universe of things.

If I told you now that I was larger than life. Would you believe me? Or would you think I was being big-headed and overly impressed with my own self-worth? I guess it doesn’t matter one way or the other really. You are what you are, and I am what I am. Another ant in the hill, another cog in the machine of life.

Do you ever experience Déjà vu? That feeling of having been there before, seen that before, lived that fleeting instant before. Moments blend into moments, people blend into images of friends from your past, scenes blend into scenes. As if you are watching life go by, observing the passing of each second though the lens of a director’s vision.

I guess that happens as you get older. How many plays can be written, how many songs can be sung, how many fashions can be created before they are just a repetition of something from the past? Time moves in one direction and life moves inexorably towards its climax.

At 10:30 this morning it was last week. And yesterday it was last year. The days blend into each other and years turn in hours. Words such as: weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, millennia. What are they? Where do they go? Interestingly, another name for a millennium is a kilo-year. Well, that was a killer-year, it lasted until lunchtime.

The years pass so quicky now that I need a Birth-month not a Birth-day. I would prefer a Birth-year, so I can really enjoy it, but that kind-of defeats the purpose of it, I suppose. Candles on the birthday cake are no longer an option. Besides the cost of the fire-permit, I no longer have enough breath.

Species, civilisations and millennia come and go. I have seen creatures walk on four legs, frighten the world with their footsteps, only to bestow power to those who come later.

I have seen civilisations that rise from a tiny village. Armies of red and gold that conquer the world. Only to be ground into the dust. Their roads of progress are all that is left now.

Tick-tock, tick-tock

An incessant knock from grand-father clock

Tick-tick, tock-tock, an oppressive din

And a loss of self, as Big Ben chimes in

How do you sleep? I never sleep. Just watch the sun, in its infinite glory. Rise and set. Rise and set. Dogs round-up the sheep, parents’ round-up their children and the Earth cycles around the Sun. Days, weeks, months, years and millennia are just arbitrary things. Meaningless concepts in the passing of Eternity.

So. Do you know me yet? Have you seen me rush pass you? Do you want to know me? I’m rather large for my age. Some would say immense. People have asked me for years to change.

I cannot change. I am what I am. Unforgiving, immense and undefeatable. Unable to sit still. Constantly moving. Passing you by. People, religions, philosophy, technology, come and go, but I never really change.

I truly am, Larger Than Life.

I may be computable

But I'm definitely unbootable

One-eyed and irrefutable

I am Father Time …

Immense and immutable.

TICK TOCK!

Tim Stix December 2020.

Tim Stix is a Software Engineer with over 20 years’ experience designing, developing and maintaining Web Technologies and is the Developer and Site Administrator of www.101world.net and bok.101world.net.

See timstix.com for more information.