Marking Time + B-Day Recap
love my pbs, being 40 feels alright
“marking time” on The Articulate Hour (pbs)
It’s no secret I like to indulge in some hot PBS programming! The Articulate Hour is a show described by PBS as exploring “our complex world through a lens of arts, culture, and science.” I know, that sounds like all of their programs.
The one-hour episode “Marking Time” (preview) covers our understanding of time. This comes at an appropriate moment personally as I just entered 40. I can’t stop thinking about how fast the weeks pass (despite how new I am at living a slowed down pace of life).
A dancer and choreographer drops a lot of wisdom, bringing up man-made, westernized time versus spiritual, organic manifestations of time. He offers insights like:
“If you wanna move into the future, you have to look at your past.”
“It’s also a problem to say the past is behind us and the future is ahead of us. It’s all one timeline. Some Amazonian tribes believe the past is in front of you, because you can actually see it. The future is behind you, because you cannot see it. So it’s just how you perceive time.”
The middle part, on music timing and patterns isn’t as mindblowing as the former, but it picks up at Circadian rhythms, philosophical takes on time, geographical differences in time, and most compelling, time seeming to go faster as you age:
“You’re laying down fewer new memories,” So “the amount of time that things seem to have taken, or how fast time seems to be going, depends on how many new memories you’re laying down. If you want your experience of life as you get older to still feel like it’s a lot of time, you should do lots of new things, lay down lots of new memories, and that makes time feel like it’s slowing down, not in a way that you’re bored but in a way that there’s a rich memory for every unit of time you’re spending.”
I’ll surely be keeping that in mind next time I think, Time is flying! But, for now, I have a week’s worth of memories to think about, thanks to:
a successful birthday celebration
It involved everyone I love (aside from a few who couldn’t make it). It’s more personal and heartwarming when people come to your birthday out here. It’s not like the city where people are always out, or the party is conveniently located next to something they’re going to afterwards. No one used it as the jumping off point before they went to their main event. Every person came out because I invited them and they wanted to be there. That’s never happened before. That’s so sick! I love everyone!! Intentionality creates personal moments which can be very meaningful.
Lately I’m keen on deeply appreciating moments that amplify love and other positive emotions. Because, had I stayed in New York, I know I’d feel depressed and sorta empty, but ever since I got here I feel lighter, like I should be here. More hinged, than un-. I’m held accountable by enough family and friends to be here, and I’m hopeful for more inspiring experiences, now that I feel better in myself, and about myself. I want to drink in this warm, heartfelt feeling forever.