Litte epiphany

So I had a little epiphany today when it comes to how fast time goes when you get older. I had gone out with a friend of mine to get lunch. This friend is significantly older than I; she’s 61. Anyhow, we had been talking about jobs and whether she still likes hers and then she said, “Well, it doesn’t really matter now because I only have two more years until retirement.”

Wow, it really hit me at that moment. I remember meeting this woman on a sunny day in August of 2007. She had just come back from vacation and had only recently turned 50. But now she was 61 and talking about retirement. And then, suddenly, it was all spread out before me, like it usually is when you have an epiphany. She’s getting older, I’m getting older. A decade can pass relatively quickly when you're older if you are not looking too hard. People change. Statuses change. Couples that you know don't just have a baby but a 2-year-old baby, jobs are gotten and lost, goals are exceeded, buildings change, streets change, the character of streets change, stores that you had loved go out of business, stores impressively remain, celebrities die, people who you had never thought would be parents become parents, Sundays are wasted, people move out, people who are old get significantly older.

Even more interesting, maybe, is that the conversation I had with this woman today took place just one block away from where we had first met, on that sunny day in August, and as I sit here and write this entry now,  my impression of her from that day is as clear and powerful as the one of her from today. Yet 11 years have passed.

When I was a kid, I never understood why adults were happy when you would say they looked young for their age. I just knew it was something they liked. I also found it confusing when they would say that time moves so fast. Well, I don't think that time always moves fast -- there are still many Sundays left, for better use -- but it can if you're not looking too hard.