8th grade 1st period Altered Time

One of my favorite experiences of playfulness winds around awareness of nonlinear time. Deep in concentrated play, an hour can slip by in a breath. Equally surprisingly time can slow down so that vast amounts of play occur within a few moments. In fact this surprises me more, for I look up and no time has passed and something wonderful has been going on. Can we attune ourselves intentionally to altered time references. Think of the universe as existing on an adjustable time/space continuum.

While playing, we can keep everything from happening at once by assuming linear time. Though sometimes it seems everything does happens all at once.

Cover the clocks; don’t wear a watch. We can always peak. Set a long enough period to play so that the time limit doesn’t structure the activity. Try different lengths of time to find how we respond to best.

We can alter our appreciation for what happens by playfully creating a document of what occurs over time. I have make a practice of writing on objects. If the date, time and location appear written on the object, attention can focus on some unique aspect of our experience in a certain moment. In so doing we enhance our memory of the moment and through the object have a souvenir of the event. (Or as we might say, the non-event.)



Time Exercise #1: Souvenir

Take an indelible marker along on a trip. It could be a vacation or even an un-looked forward to event. Remember part of our purpose brings play back into all aspects of our life. Proceeding through the event, write on objects that avail themselves. Write the date, time and location somewhere on the object and make a collection of these objects. Consider including some other detail of interest. Maybe include snippets of overheard conversations. Bring them home for review later.

1-10-2008 3:45pm 96778-2971 sound of excavator over on the waterfront, smell of lava rock and oil recalled from yesterday’s bike ride, written in tiny black letters on the bottom of an empty cylindrical cardboard oatmeal container.

Consider attaching a thread to each one and a few small objects. These small tokens on threads can be grouped and the threads used as a bookmark. We can annotate the book mark to record the books it marked.

Or consider copying notes onto the objects. Using a different style of text or color of ink to distinguish various annotations. By running everything together we also alter our perception of time. See how changing the size of the script or using the other hand to write alters perception. Using the same annotation style allows pieces to be grouped possibly out of sequence, which on closer inspection creates a different sense of time.

Expand the idea of what can be written upon. Certain times we want to hide the annotation; other times we want it up front and center. Trust hunches about where to put text. When placing surfaces together, piece them together thoughtfully, unless thoughtfully becomes too controlled. Then just be aware of how fingers are drawn to place them and look and see if a pattern reveals itself. Consider this like putting a puzzle together where the objects serve as our pieces and we establish the edge of the puzzle.



I like to make arrangements in drawers for this reason. Some times a level of humor introduces itself randomly. A breath or two for observation might reveal some hidden aspect of what at first seemed a random assortment.
Thus, we may be quite impressed by the way the patterns play with our imagination and dovetail to tell an unexpected story. Will they lead toward some new idea or association? When we can touch into this flow of playfulness we involve ourselves in a very special relationship among time, space, self and being.