Time is such a mysterious little devil.  How a 10 hour stretch of time can extend outward, endless, dragging by in agonizing drips and dribbles is as real as the way a four day span can dissapear before you've even tasted the pleasure of it's potential.  Holding time is a little like holding rain in your bare hands, never entirely sure you actually held it there except for the wetness left behind as evidence. 

I was searching through long ago packed boxes - although "long ago" is a relative term I suppose - boxes packed by others in my absence, packed for me by treasured friends, and I kept getting caught up in small bites of memories.  A photograph here, a scribbled note on a scrap of paper, an outdated and overflowing calendar trigger memories of time past. 

It is not just the memory that is triggered, that bittersweet recollection of some pre-experienced event, that draws my attention to the concept of time passing, but it is the sudden knowledge of how often in the past I've paused and told myself "don't forget this moment!" and then tried to saturate my senses with the moment at hand... and how many of those moments that are lost to me now.  Time, slipping away from my grasp like raindrops rushing away - always replaced by more time, more rain, more grasping.

I think one of my earliest memories is of being  3 or 4 years old and being teased by my brothers.  I'm certain I didn't pause in that moment and tell myself to remember, remember, remember the scent of the air, the sunshine coming through the window and illuminating dancing dust motes, the feel of the carpet under my bare knees, yet I can clearly remember those fragmented images. 

Those images, as well as feelings of helpless rage at being teased, are as vivid to me as is the memory of last night when I stood outside in the cold crisp peace to gaze up at the moon.  When I close my eyes, although I am currently in a musty overheated room, I can smell the sharp hint of snow on the breeze, still feel the way my arms rippled with goosebumps and my toes immediately lost sensation as I stood on the not yet frozen ground, and the eerie sensation of watching the moon watch me.  Yet, I can't remember the last time I shared a tender moment with the man who I was supposed to be married to until death.  I can't remember his voice, not even when I try.  I can't remember what it was like to look into his eyes, to share a sidelong parental smile over a childs head, or the feel of his touch.  Mysterious devil, that thing called 'Time', and equally mysterious is 'memory' itself.

I want now not so much to hold onto moments that are passing, but to fully immerse myself within each moment that is given to me.  I want not to worry about remembering a moment, not to grasp at time even as it is slipping away, but to engage in time as it comes and as it goes so that even if I can't remember a moment, I will know intrinsically that I have HAD each moment.  Time will escape me, memories will be evasive, and I cannot hold onto every moment and store them up as treasures, but I can experience each moment to it's fullest capacity whether it be full of joy or grief.

I think I'm going to let go of time.  I'll stop frantically grasping at what I can't hold onto anyway, and focus my energy on tasting raindrops.