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| Me working on my SPACE mural Photo by Jami Marlowe |
"The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery." - Francis Bacon
THE RELATIVE DISTANCE of memories is a peculiar
phenomenon of aging. Think back to when you were a child and how every minute
between holidays felt like a month. For most of us, birthdays were the best
thing imaginable, our own personal holiday where time and space and gravity
bent in our direction. There was a perceived upgrade in status that came with
being another year older; we were allowed more and more autonomy of our lives. But
in time, most of us discover that our youthful perceptions are warped by inexperience,
and every upgrade comes with more and more responsibility. By the time most of
us have reached our early twenties, that precipice between the so-called
freedom of youth and previously-coveted responsibility of adulthood, we’re just
starting to sense the shift in our perception of time.
It happens incrementally, barely noticeable at
first. The event we thought occurred a year ago was actually two years ago. A
movie sequel is released and we suddenly realize it’s been more years than we
thought since the previous installment came out. Someone’s name gets mentioned
and it takes a second to recall who they are, then you wonder how you could
have ever forgotten that person. Or someone’s name is mentioned and you
immediately know who they are, but you suddenly realize how long it’s been
since you’ve been in touch. Then the occurrences pick up the pace, but we don’t
notice. Babies are born, then they’re talking, then they’re tweens, and we
remember buying them outdated gifts for birthdays long passed. In our twenties, we are fully-formed adults in the eyes of
twelve-year olds, even though we know we’re nowhere close to that. For them, as
it had been for us, minutes are months, but for us now months streak by like
minutes, and the clock ticks on. The time swirls into a temporal mural with
memories as the paint, and one’s lifetime as the wall it’s applied to.
