AT NO better or worse time is the lament about the speed of time heard than during the advent of a new year.
With all the festive ruckus, the transition cannot be ignored. Inevitably, people bitch about time’s speed.
How time flies, moan people who think they have so much to do and so little time.
Nothing new about the griping, which writers and other thinkers have aptly noted.
Nicolas Boileau Despreaux writes: “Time flies and draws us with it. The moment in which I am speaking is already far from here.” Jim Bishop refers to the same velocity of time: “Nothing is as far away as one minute.”
Cartoon character Dilbert uses a simile: “Imagine a donut fired from a cannon at the speed of light while rotating. Time is like that, except without the cannon and donut.” Dunkin Donuts would love time’s furious pace if it means people eating more of its donuts.
In high school we learned about relativity of time: It zooms fast when you’re kissing a girl at the corridor but crawls when a science teacher waits for you to tell the class why the earth tilts about 23 degrees on its axis.
Perception
But why do grandparents talk a lot about time having rushed by and the years flitting more quickly?
A.J. Jacobs (in his book “Know-It-All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World”) cites an Encyclopedia Britannica theory: Seniors find time shorter because they “notice long-accustomed changes less frequently.”
They notice less, say, the coming of Sinulog or the war veterans’ parade but, like children, they wait excitedly for the release of City Hall’s cash gift cum vote-purchase price.
(paseares@yahoo.com)