Time is a fickle thing. In the western tradition we tend to describe it as something we continuously move through with a constant speed and direction, but I’ve come across some other interesting descriptions lately that I think are worth considering.

In PrairyErth: A Deep Map author William Least Heat-Moon notes that in western philosophy time is might be described as a river, however, Native Americans would have viewed time as more of a lake, something you are immersed in and can explore at your leisure (note that I have no idea if the Native American part is actually true).

In Ted Chiang’s short story Stories of Your Life and Others (which the movie Arrival was based on), the protagonist develops something of a circular view of her life and time and general, essentially knowing all of what will happen and has happened, but experiencing it in real time. It’s worth a read despite my paltry description. Anyway, Chiang references a Steven King quote as part of the inspiration for the story:

Stephen Hawking … found it tantalizing that we coould not remember the future. But remembering the future is childs play for me now. I know what will become if my helpless trusting babies because the are grown ups now. I know how my my closest friends will end up because so many of them are retired or dead now … To Stephen HAwking and all others younger than myself I say, ‘Be patient. Your future will come to you and lie down at your feet like a dog who knows and loves you no matter what you are.’ “

Stephen King

I’m rereading a short volume called Seven Brief Lessons on Physics by Italian physicist Carlo Rovelli. He points out that without heat dissipation, there is no time. If a pendulum didn’t dissipate heat and slow down, it would be the same thing forwards or backwards. There would be no straight arrow through time.

I’m also reminded of a deceptively simple graphic novel (although there are no words in it) called Here by Richard McGuire. In the book, Mcguire explores all that happens in a single corner of a room, going back and forth in time over hundreds and eventually thousands of years.

That is without even discussing how we experience time, and the fact that time can seem to speed up or slow down based on what we’re doing.

I find it useful to remind myself of all this on the occasional weekday evening when I am overwhelmed by my to-do list and feel like there is not enough time in the world. Time, you see, is indeed a fickle thing.