I notice these days that when I think about things in my distant past, when I think about being 20 or 30, that so many memories that seemed very long and are important to me were actually very short in terms of time spent. That is, the world could turn over in a minute: the intense love affair that lasted really only two weeks; the year I took a graduate degree, moved, changed jobs three times, learned a new culture, became pregnant, and watched every bit of the Watergate investigation - so many things packed into so short a time. Of course, I had much more energy then to accomplish a lot, and I didn't need to spend the recovery time from overdoing it that I do now, but still, it is amazing to me that out of a 66 year life I can recall so vividly a few days or a few weeks that feel as if they must have been much longer. Intense enough that the memory lives in an emotional time zone that seems to not be prejudiced by how many days or months were involved. Funny that:)
I can't decide if it is because I am just slower to latch on to things and work through them or if my emotions, tempered by the years, are not so extreme as they were then, but if feels that I live in a different, less erratic time zone now. An eldertime zone. Habits I once eschewed have crept into my lifestyle and slow me down; my body slows me down; and I am pretty sure my mind slows me down compared to the quickness with which I grabbed life in my youth.
Or perhaps I am just more cautious. Certainly I have not given up having new experiences and I stay almost as busy as ever, but everything now takes more time, and I seldom rocket to emotional extremes. Maybe I have finally found balance.
I am not unhappy with my eldertime zone, but it is more a waltz than rock n' roll, and I find some loss in that.
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