We are often out of step, time and I. When I want to play, time runs away. And comes to tag me when I’m not looking.
I don’t understand years, weeks, days or minutes. The last twelve months felt too long and too short at the same time. They were entirely too much and they were unbearably empty. Either I am running after time or time is chasing me. We are never together.
It plays hide and seek. I want to do neither, hide nor seek. I want to sit and chat. Maybe dance a little. My feet don’t carry me fast enough, I’m still looking for a place to hide when a long forgotten memory crawls out of the darkness and pounces on me from behind. “Catch!” says a little girl. Once upon a time, there was a little girl who liked to dance. We heard she died. Her ghost sits on my shoulders and laughs. Bobs to a rhythm I can feel but do not hear. It makes me lose balance, but I manage not to fall and not let her fall. I have so many questions. She has answers. But if I open my mouth, she will fly away. That’s the deal. I stay quiet, she stays perched. It’s a dare. It’s a long game, but we are good at waiting, time and me.
When a good song fell on the girl’s ears, it went straight to her shoulders and feet. She only knew the one step she had always known, a little shrug and tap and bob. It was uncomplicated and moved the music through her body. Music is how you mark time, they say. But there were so many other cool, new steps the others had. She wanted to join in. Those steps were intricate, they didn’t come naturally to her. She needed to study them, learn. She snuck into dusty corners on the side of time to practice. By the time she did, the music changed and so did the steps. She should’ve stuck to her own dance. She slipped off time. Never heard of again. Her body was never found. Or so we heard. But dances don’t die, they just lie in wait for the right song. Some dances create their own song. I can feel a tune coming out of her bobs on my shoulders.
The year is coming to a close. What are my plans for the next one, time asks. The question feels like an insinuation. What more can I do, I say getting defensive, other than what I have been doing all along, you tell me, I shoot back, what are your resolutions for next year, how are you going to be better? Can you get your head out of your own monotonous ticking-tocking, come over to the side and walk with me a while, at my pace? Maybe dance a little, I ask, bobbing to the girl’s beat.
Time looks at me sideways and carries on its incessant march, pretending I didn’t speak, because if I did, it would have to fly away. This is the game we play.
Delicious 😋
This is beautiful.