Dane Leehman
FYS—What is Time?
Experiences with Time
9/16/2012
Cherishing the Moment
Time stood still. Lord Botetourt had just dumbfounded our defense, opening up an uncontested layup with no more difficulty than a can opener has piercing into aluminum. The game was tied at 51-51. Our men were tired, worn from the long, nail-biting battle but 7.6 seconds still remained on the clock. We could not survive through an overtime period—they had all of the momentum after overcoming a 15-point halftime deficit. Coach Day was forced to burn our last timeout. He ripped out the whiteboard and drew up a foolproof strategy designed to get Destiny, our best shooter, wide open for a heart-breaking three pointer. My teammates and I hustled to our respective positions after breaking the huddle.
Krulich received the ball just behind the half-line. My job was simple—I was the barrier, the screen positioned on the baseline which would block Destiny’s man, opening him up for the dagger. Krulich took two quick dribbles toward my side of the court and waited for Destiny to be abandoned for the baseline three. They saw right through our trickery and both Destiny’s man and my own shifted out to cover our ace shooter, leaving me wide open 12 feet from the basket. Eyes focused directly on Destiny, Krulich bee-lined the ball into my hands. Right foot pivoted and left foot followed as I leaped into my well-practiced rhythm. The ball held the weight of the world, but it lifted off my fingertips lighter than a feather and propelled toward the basket. It hovered in the air, dwindling as it came into its descent, taunting and teasing. The clock was still winding down at a normal pace, but each moment the ball was in the air was longer and denser. It reached the rim and danced a marvelous dance, dazzling the crowd and hypnotizing with each twist and spin around the side of the hoop. All of a sudden, swoosh, whack, REEEHHNNTTTT—the clock had reached zero, the moment we had waited 32 minutes for. A rush of heat and emotion, the roar of the home crown, and a gush of brisk air as my team stampeded me. I yelled inconsolably and victoriously, overwhelmed with pride and passion—I was the hero tonight.
Looking back now, I realize that I did not play a particularly amazing game that night. The game winning shot provided the only two points I scored the entire night whereas Destiny had knocked down 24 and Krulich contributed 10 of his own, and yet I was celebrated as winning the game for my team. Why did my one shot bear more weight than the 10 shots Destiny had buried? How was it that those last 7.6 seconds, nay the last .8 seconds as the ball traveled through the air seemed infinitely longer than the rest of the game leading up to those points? Why is it that a kid can breeze through seven hours of video games when they are unable to spend five minutes waiting in a shopping line? Time is an impossible riddle, an indefinite trickster. The way we perceive time in one moment can be completely different than any another and that is why it is difficult to answer any of these questions absolutely.
When I was young boy, my mother forced me to play piano. She insisted that it helps open young minds and improves rhythm, balance, and harmony with practice. This hobby held me to a rigid schedule; every Monday and Friday I would meet with my teacher for an hour and a half and every other day I would be expected to practice at least an hour. This was easy to maintain over the summer when free time was so abundant boredom was around every corner, but harder when schoolwork was piling up on top of being a multidimensional athlete. My schedule was compressed and binding. Some weeks would drag on while others seemed be past before they were ever present, over with the snap of a finger. This has always been amazing to me—how any given increment of time can fly like an arrow or stick like a beached whale which is why the standard measurements (or really any constant measurement) of time are impractical to me. How can we say someone has lived for seventy years without knowing whether they lived each moment to its fullest or dismissed chunks of their lives not valuing the time they have? We each dictate how long we live. An hour spent watching television can be infinitesimal and dismissible while a moment spent with a loved one can be immortal. Furthermore, if you barely and painfully manage to get through an hour of work that is subsequently forgotten by the next hour spent with friends that you will remember and relive every day, how can the two hours be considered equal? Time is dictated by the life we squeeze out of it, not by how many times a hand spins around the face of a clock.
This spring I was diagnosed with a minor heart condition. I was told in February that two months later I would have to have a surgery. At the time I thought nothing of it—it was an eternity away and therefore played little impact in my day-to-day life. But as the days drove on, I could feel April 27th knocking louder and louder on the door of fate. I panicked. Although it is an inexcusably overused cliché, I saw my life flash before my eyes. I remembered skipping school to go fishing with my mom at age 6. I remembered the family trip to Hawaii where I saw true beauty and innovation at age 9. I remembered the moment right before I fell unconscious as I was cleated in the face playing goalie in soccer at age 14. All the events leading up to this life-defining surgery collaborated, meshed, and unified in the blink of an eye. I had condensed my entire life into one pinnacle moment. My heart rushed with anticipation and confusion—lack of understanding, but it only took one long, drawn-out breath to calm myself and regain my composure and the continuum began to race ahead at normal pace.
Although it is necessary for society to function and progress into the future, the definition of time we have grown to accept is grossly oversimplified and unrepresentative. We must construct our own definition of time and accept the fact that any moment we will never forget is immensely longer than a day our mind dismisses. Everyone has experienced an hour which shoots past as well as a moment which seemed like it would never end. To have a valuable and well-lived life we must each strive to value each and every moment within that life. This is why we cannot take any situation for granted. We have the power to make our own lives immortal because any moment can last an eternity. The challenge is finding true inspiration and each remarkable feature within every passing second. Life is what you make of it…
I completely understand how you feel. Last spring, I was also told that I needed to have surgery, knee surgery. I was diagnosed with a knee problem a couple years ago, and since then, my doctors had been telling me that I needed to have surgery at some point. However, both my parents and I thought that the surgery was going to be pointless and so I just kept going to physical therapy, hoping that the surgery will not be necessary. However, last spring, as I awaited the surgery, I felt time go faster and faster and soon, it was time to go to the hospital. I know my situation was a lot different from yours, considering I would’ve been fine without the surgery, but I still felt that something was different in my life. I was only eighteen years old when I had knee surgery, something many people in their 60s and 70s when they do. As a result, I felt that time is constant; it is constantly moving forwards and it never stops. Thus, I learned that I must take care of my body, instead of overworking it like I did prior to my surgery, and not to take anything, neither my body nor time, for granted because I know neither of these are immortal.
This essay is beautiful, in both words and emotion. The concepts you discussed within, mainly the idea of perception of time, is something that everyone experiences but no one fully understands, and frankly should never fully understand because that would ruin the beauty of those moments. People forget that time is a beautiful and meaningful thing which is there to help us lead lives where the best is remembered and experienced longer and the worst is left to rush by. I’ve never had an experience with a surgery but I was involved in a car accident my sophomore year. I saw it coming, every moment was still shots as the car came closer and closer and finally hit. I don’t remember the collision, I remember the sound, the feeling, but no vision. Time was different, in those short few seconds I had transcended outside of the ‘normal’ perception of time and entered a place where you couldn’t quantify it, just live it. Those moments in themselves are special though, because they teach you the joys of time, how a simple perception should be cherished more than anything because the moments leading up to and during time’s mind boggling perceptual changes are what is remembered. Thank you for sharing your experience with us.