How old is this moment?
by Lian Brook-Tyler
How old is this moment?
As we collectively, and perhaps somewhat unwittingly, speed towards lives that are increasingly digital, at some point over the last couple of years, I began spontaneously pausing and taking a moment to consider my present reality, and how far I could go back in time and this moment actually be from then… maybe it’s a wake-up call to notice what’s really real, gratitude to those that have gone before me, or a prayer from our past to our future.
For example, the phone I’m writing on aside, in this moment…
I’m lying in a brass bed - around in this form since the mid-1800s, back when Dickens was writing A Christmas Carol, and photography had just been invented.
My dogs are snuggled next to me, this could be a scene from any time in the last 30,000 years, thanks to our long ago ancestors doing us a solid by throwing scraps to wolves. Nothing like an ice age to make one appreciate the warmth of a good dog curled around your feet at night.
The dressing table next to me is a late Victorian washstand - I love applying my lipstick where long ago ladies did their ablutions.
The silver hand mirror lying upon it is also over 100 years old and still in daily use, faithfully reflecting my image in the way it’s reflected faces of people who are now held in someone’s cherished memory.
The stack of books next to me could be from any time in the past couple of thousand years, though the paperbacks a little more recently, thanks to Penguin books beginning to publish paper books in 1935, during the reign of King George V.
The house I’m in is 400 years old. Perhaps a carpenter was lovingly carving its beams at the very moment Shakespeare was penning “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” It was also when the witch trials were happening - the beam above the inglenook fireplace bears witch marks, placed there for spiritual protection.
And the only light present beamed 8 minutes ago from a 4.6 billion year old star that’s blessed our planet since the beginning.
How old is your moment?
♥️
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