’22

Where did that year just go? How is it Christmas again?

At fifty-three, I’m way beyond the mid-life crisis stage of my journey, but I’ve yet to arrive at the age where I can indiscriminately dole out life advice, mainly because I still need to figure it out myself. However, I can assure you of something that is true – Time is short.

Everyone’s heard it; it’s singularly the most neglected piece of advice we will ever receive: ‘Time passes quicker the older you get, so make the most of it’ – It’s not even a cliche; it’s a scientifically proven fact – time’s inherently linked to the amount of time we have already lived; this is why the days leading up to Christmas, for a 7-year-old, feel like weeks, but when you’re 70, last Christmas seems like it was only a month ago. It’s all proportional. 

A couple of months ago, I bought a plaid shirt with a warm fleecy lining; last week, winter arrived, and I was delighted to wear it in anger. But then, skimming back through photos on my phone, I realised that it wasn’t a couple of months ago; I’d bought it on the 2nd of January whilst on a bus road trip to Kendal. A year ago. So then I started looking through images in my portfolio, seeing portraits I’d made in 2008 of an 18-year-old and realising she’s now thirty-three.

In 1980, when I was ten, the year 2000 was ‘The Future’. Look where we are now; the millennium was nearly a quarter of a century ago. According to the books I read as a kid, humans should now be living in fully automated space pods, orbiting a planet now inhabited by the new species of cat people. ‘Soylent Green’, a movie set in a dystopian future of dying oceans and perpetual humidity caused by global warming – was set in 2022 and could almost be a documentary.

I know, I wasn’t going to offer any unsolicited advice. Nevertheless, life is disappointingly short and getting shorter by the day, and there’s only one way to slow down the illusion. Monotony is the destroyer of time; try to do or be somewhere different every day and stop buying shit you don’t need; instead, use the money to go somewhere new, even if it’s just a bus ticket to Kendal.

Whether it’s happening in three days, three weeks, or a couple of months ago –

Happy Christmas.