Time

As a child a year seemed to last an eternity. The time from sunset on Christmas Day to sunrise of the next Christmas Day, the unit by which I measured all time, seemed almost a lifetime. A year felt long.

As an adult with children a year feels short, fleeting almost. Careful, don’t blink or you’ll miss the whole of 2007.

So what’s changed? A year is still just a year. Three hundred sixty-five days. No more, no less (well, except for those pesky leap years).

I know that I am not alone. Every parent I talk to speaks wistfully of the passage of time, of their babies turning into school age children and not having enough time with which to accomplish certain tasks.

It almost seems a cliché.

So, when does the acceleration of time stop? Does it? Will I feel that two years passed as quickly as I now feel one does when I’m seventy? Or does it start to slow down again? And why does it accelerate? Is it merely becoming an adult that triggers this change in perception or is it tied to having children?

I have no answers, only questions that bring about more questions.