Tisha Deutsch is becoming a frequent visitor and participant on our site.  Wherever does she find the time? (seven kids, I understand, of assorted shapes, sizes and colors)  Perhaps her contest entry gives us a clue how she finds, makes, or borrows time at all. (If you borrow time, do you have to pay it back?) Her entry reminds me of something I read years ago, in my teens.  “All the time in the world–just not enough life in it.”  See what you think.  Here is her entry into our contest “Wherefore a.r.t. though?”

The Art of Allowing Time

by Tisha Deutsch

Absolute, relentless, thorough – for better and for worse – the hands of time take the puzzle pieces of our lives and toy with them. Without pausing for permission, they incessantly tick, every man falling prey to their advancement.

Seemingly carelessly, as if the movements made were of little or no consequence, they continuously shape and form, sculpting our days, eventually etching an image we accept, only to modify it once more, then again….

Some of the changes they bring are subtle, undetectable until we quiet ourselves long enough to reflect, peering back over the years, recalling chapters of our story that kindly, unremarkably, drew to a close. They offer the slightest gradual shift, merciful to our souls, gently loosening gripping fingers reluctant to open.

Others arrive suddenly, jolting us to the core. As a thief in the night they enter with force, demanding what we aren’t willing to give. Walls we presumed solid and secure, ones we carefully, purposefully built brick by brick, tumble down, harsh, devastating, and cruel. In an instant, we realize, instinctively, that everything real to us has been irrevocably altered.

Scarcely noticed, fragments of the puzzle may drop to the ground, become trodden underfoot, isolated and ignored. In their absence gaping holes are left. Finally coming to terms with the blank spaces, we cope, grieve, medicate, avoid. Mustering the strength to move on, we summon sufficient courage to brave another dawn, clinging to hope that we will one day meet wholeness again, knowing that if we do, it will be well earned.

Most of us, once in a great while would assert that time’s hands must have stopped altogether, for one exquisite second as we humbly witness the wonder of newness while counting our baby’s toes or when we realize we have found lasting favor, liberating love with another being. We surrender to the exhilaration of triumph in overcoming pervasive fear, or marvel at our appropriate smallness while lying in the fresh grass gazing upward toward the uncontainable sky. We close our eyes and feel the warmth of the sun on our face, then watch it  fade into the horizon, beyond the ocean’s shore, orange and pink and golden and radiant, majestic, and we are certain we must have smelled the fragrance of God Himself, if only for an instant.

Hiding away the memories, we store them in the secret compartments of our hearts, the occasions when we were sure of one thing: we have tasted the purest goodness this life has to offer, moments when time stood still.

Certainly, time and change tirelessly refine. We lose, we gain, rising and falling, over and again. And, in the end, if we’ve proven ourselves apt pupils, we will become hospitable hosts to the hours of our days and years, graciously welcoming the turning of the clock, learning to receive and relinquish, to embrace and to grant freedom, to savor, and to move forward, all in due time.

Does a bigger clock mean you get more time?

And isn’t it about time you entered our contest? www.awordwithyoupress.com/2011/01/27/wherefore-a-r-t-though-our-contest-for-february-begins-now/