time is circular. at least it’s represented that way. it starts where it ends and then starts all over again. we glide from one moment to the next. some moments seem longer, others seem to go by a few ticks at a time. eventually, the clock stops. but what about the ticking? the clock itself moves the hands. there’s no telling when the clock is going to stop, but the hands can be stopped at anytime. i feel like i’ve been following the hands for a while, floating from moment to moment, letting the ticking dictate how i spend my time. i’m ready to stop the hands. i like it here. i’m gonna stay put for a while and not worry about what i should do by the time the hands come back around.

i’m sitting here thinking about the last 24 years of my life. they’ve gone quickly, not all at once, but in retrospect. and, if time is relative, does that mean that the next 24 years are going to go by twice fast as the last 24? even though it’s the same amount of time, it will relatively be only half the time i’ve already lived. then what do i want out of the next 24 years? which is relatively like the last 12 years. what have i done since i was 12? will i be satisfied doing the same amount of things by the time i’m 48 that i’ve done since i was 12, since that’s all i relatively have? every moment i’ve lived since 7th grade is relatively all i’m gonna live until i’m almost 50. i want more. i mean, technically i have 26 more years until i’m 50, which is 2 more years than the life i’ve lived thus far. but, everything that i’ve done since i was 12 will feel the same as everything i will do from now until 48, which makes me feel relatively young, but the fact that i’m already forgetting things i’ve done in the last 12 years makes me feel relatively old. i never fully understood the whole “if someone takes off into space at the speed of light and comes back one year later, many years will have passed” thing. why? a year is a year. is that why kids overreact to things? because at the time of the event that they are overreacting to, it’s one of the worst things that’s happened in they’re whole life? do we only react to things based on what we have already experienced or do we hit a plateau where we find a comfort zone for our own emotions? or if you were hypothetically immortal, would you one day be nearly void of all emotion? i think of the first i had coffee… i can barely taste it now. what else fades over time? do we even realize how quickly things change? how quickly we change? or do you just enjoy today and think about it all at the end, hoping there’s someone there to help remind you? we only use 10 percent of our brains. how can we possibly forget anything? what’s the other 90 percent doing? if the earth was once nothing but land and minerals and vegetation and over time we figured out how to write a blog from a phone with a touchscreen, using the internet from a satellite, then what the hell is the other 90 percent doing? why are we born into a place with absolutely no answers and with no way to find an answer and then we’re gone, only to spend our whole lives asking questions we’ll never have the answers to? if the amount of sleep we get every night is relatively less and less, do we just get more and more tired as we get older? is that why kids have so much energy and old people nap? with that said, i should probably go to bed. i’m gonna be 25 in less than 2 months and i think i hate Albert Einstein.

time isn’t real.

we invented it. we invented it to track where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re going. we use it to catalog events and history. we created the concept of time based on a given planetary cycle. we invented sun dials. we invented clocks. how long is a second? you can’t answer that, because it’s a series of moments with an undefined length. we’ve put systems in place to try to consistently and accurately measure the different lengths of time we’ve created, because we invented time.

time doesn’t exist.

and yet, time is the only thing that forever exists.

i’m out with my friends. i meet someone that i’m interested in. i get their number.

what do i do now? do i call tomorrow? day after tomorrow? maybe i text something before the end of the night. maybe i text something the next day. ok, so i call the next day, she doesn’t answer. but my number shows up on her caller id. do i leave message? do i play it cool and not leave a message, knowing i can call again? but then, when i call again, my number shows up, again. now i have to leave a message. two calls. should i have texted and then called and saved the second call? should i have called then texted? should i have just left a message on the first call?

go back 30 years.

i’m out with my friends. i meet someone that i’m interested in. i get their number.

i call the next day, she doesn’t answer. doesn’t matter, she doesn’t know who the eff called. i can call all night and all day. she’ll never know. hell, i can keep calling til i get that broad on the phone. or i can leave a message,… and then keep on calling. ring, ring, ring, ring, ring.

if only it was that easy now.

it was a simpler time.

remember when your mom told you to be somewhere at 6? and if you weren’t there, at that exact spot, at 6 sharp, you either had a quarter for the pay phone or walked home? and even if you did have a quarter, hopefully she was home by the time you called. God forbid you don’t hang up the pay phone before the answering machine comes on (three rings or four? three rings or four? THREE RINGS OR FOUR RINGS?! crap, i don’t remember!!!),… or else you’re out 25 cents and you’re REALLY walking home.

remember when you had your first car and gave a friend a ride home for the first time and they gave you 2 dollars for gas money?… and you were psyched!!!

remember how upset you got when you rented a vhs tape from blockbuster, got home, popped it in, and the credits were rolling?! UUGHHHH!!! i have to rewind this before i watch it?! how rude.

it was a simpler time.