Time, and again...

 "The greatest teacher of economics is Time."


     There are two are two images that come to mind when I think of time. First, a place. There is always a place in time. And too often people try to take it with them. Perhaps it was a moment with a child at a playground or a coversation with a friend over the phone. But when they take it, to relive again, they forget what made it beautiful is that it happend then and not now. What made it unforgettable was that it wasn't always there. And perhaps the greatest beauty is found in pain because it shows one cared. And the Second, a saturation. Time will cease to exist, but our memories will continue. Life is a gift of God, a constant revelation of His beauty and His creation. And when we remember these two things, I believe we begin to understand the Apostle Paul when he said, "To live is Christ, and to die is gain."

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;  A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace. What profit hath he that worketh in that wherein he laboureth? I have seen the travail, which God hath given to the sons of men to be exercised in it. He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end. I know that there is no good in them, but for a man to rejoice, and to do good in his life. And also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy the good of all his labour, it is the gift of God.

                                                                                    ~ King Solomon, Ecclesiastæs

Because I could not stop for Death,

He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labour, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

We passed the school where children played,
Their lessons scarcely done;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.

Since then 'tis centuries; but each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.
 

                            ~ Emily Dickinson, Because I could not stop for Death