Dear Friends,

 

Have you noticed how fast the year is going by? Time certainly flies by during the summer holidays; the 'Back to School' notices which appear in the shops as soon as the summer term ends

don't help. In my teaching days, I used to dread the first appearance of blackberries, because it meant that the Autumn term was approaching fast.

 

Holidays seem to go even faster than 'normal' days. We were fortunate to have two weeks away in Dorset this August. During the first week the empty days seemed  to stretch away into infinity; then suddenly time galloped, and before we knew it it was time to go home, and there we were on the beach on the final evening, making the most of the last hour before reluctantly tearing ourselves away.

 

I suspect that our lives are something like summer holidays – idyllic at the beginning, with many years seeming to stretch ahead of us. But time soon starts to march on  fast, and before we know it we are planning for retirement and we're not sure how much time we have left.

 

The poet W.H.Auden expressed this hauntingly in his poem 'One Evening':

 

            As I walked out one evening,

                Walking down Bristol Street,

            The crowds upon the pavement

                Were fields of harvest wheat.

 

            And down by the brimming river

                I heard a lover sing

            Under an arch of the railway:

                'Love has no ending.'

 

            But all the clocks in the city

                Began to whir and chime:

            'O Let not Time deceive you,

                You cannot conquer Time.

 

            In headaches and in worry

                Vaguely life leaks away,

            And Time will have his fancy

                Tomorrow or to-day.

 

Thinking of all this, I was reminded of some words I once saw on a sundial – that traditional measure of the passing hours – which went like this:

 

            When as a child I laughed and wept  

           Time crept

            When as a youth I waxed more bold

            Time strolled

            When I became a full-grown man

            Time ran

            When older still I daily grew

            Time flew

            Soon I shall find, in passing on

            Time gone

 

I'm sorry if this all sounds rather melancholy – that's not my intention; though there is an inevitable sadness about the passing of time. But I am comforted by an old Latin tag which my first husband David, a history teacher, who for 15 years had been a Benedictine monk, used to quote. He would sometimes sum up a conversation with the words, 'Well, you have to look at this sub specie aeternitatae' which, he told me, could roughly be translated as 'in the context of eternity'.

We are creatures, not just of time (which we are in our earthly lives) but of eternity. Time can be a crude way of measuring life;we know that some days, which are not very interesting, can seem endless, while a really special moment can have significance for a lifetime – and can indeed have an eternal quality about it. Perhaps watching a wonderful sunset, or chatting with a loved one,

or listening to a special piece of music – these are moments out of time, which give us a glimpse of the eternity to which we belong.

 

Whether the holiday of your lifetime is just beginning, or is drawing towards a close, may you enjoy  those special moments with wonder. Don't  be be like the French writer Colette, whose picture I have in front of me in my study, with her quotation 'I've had such a wonderful life. I only wish I had realised it sooner.' 

 

 

With love,

Rosey