Time is very different depending on whether you are standing in front or behind it. This occurred to me today as I was simply thinking about how I had projected the evening, and then how it lay after I had stepped through it.
This morning and early afternoon I gave only four lessons, but all were to students that had played in the recital yesterday. Recitals are great for a number of reasons, one of which is that it makes people practice that might not normally prioritize it. Just as it's possible to look forward to time and to look back on it, so too can we include people into this. I might project an expectation of an individual, or I might reflect on where they've been and how they've changed. We exist in this space, as do all the people around us, and to step away from our expectations and projections can feel very absurd. I reflect much less than I project, I think. What would it be to be without any expectation of another person? To be filled newly with them every time I see them? In this way it was very liberating to see straighter bows, higher knuckles, greater awareness than I had seen before in a certain individual.
Maybe this is why death can be so absurd. It locks us to the past. There is no more projection in our understanding of the person we loved, only memories to replay. I remember feeling this when I suddenly learned of someone's death, the feeling of time being severed. And this is perhaps what is magical about it as well: something to shake us to see a new order to time. What is tomorrow, what is yesterday? We are here, now.
No comments:
Post a Comment