Another Rotary Invocation - November 2013
When Greg Albright sent me an email last week reminding me about this week's duty to present another invocation I was a little surprised. I had intended to pass it off to another member because I was involved with a CEO-Net event in Carmel on the same day . . . and I had just given an invocation. I was stumped for a subject.
The end of Daylight Saving Time last weekend gave me the idea to talk about time.
The end of Daylight Saving Time last weekend gave me the idea to talk about time.
Ever since I was a boy I’ve been fascinated with time.
Back then, science could tell time to the millionth of a second. Now, we keep it to better than a trillionth. For comparison, light travels about one foot in one nanosecond – one billionth of a second. GPS and the Internet can’t work if clocks are wrong by just a few of them. We’ve gone from telling time by the change in the colors of the seasons to telling time by the change in the color of light that reaches us from the stars.
Most of us live minute to minute. By comparison an impossibly vast amount of time – if you’re a computer. It’s all relative. Einstein, the expert of relativity, noted the time you spend with a pretty girl is relatively short when compared to the time you spend sitting on a hot stove – though both time periods may be the same.
Everyone wants to save time – but there is no hoarding it. Time is the great equalizer. Everyone has less than they need, but according to Chief Red Jacket, of the Six Nations of New York, everyone has all there is.
Time and tide wait for no man.
I see time pass in the birthdays of my grandchildren. I wonder if they realize those ‘endless days’ til Christmas, til Spring, til birthdays, til whatever will someday pass like ice melts in hot tea. Look away and it’s gone.
How to make time slow? I’ve found one way: live today. The setting of appointments and anniversaries is particularly problematic. Like the time between them is ‘fly over country.’ Lacking an excuse to pay attention, time filled with work, we compress away those spaces like ‘filler,’ and lose the time to anticipation.
Oliver Wendell Homes, the astute early 20th century Supreme Court Justice said: ‘I do despise making the most of one’s time. Half of the pleasure of life consists of the opportunities one has neglected.’ ‘Life is What Happens To You While You’re Busy Making Other Plans,’ wrote a more contemporary artist of our language, John Lennon.
Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity*
Dr. Seuss said: “How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon. December is here before it's June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?”
* Henry Van Dyke
