Do you ever look back to a certain point in time and wonder, “how has so much time passed since then?"
Sometimes I wonder how it’s already July when it feels as though the year 2022 has just begun. But here we are, almost halfway if not more than halfway through the year. Often, I will recollect a memory that impacted me significantly or lives quite vividly in the recesses of my brain, and I will think, “there was no way that was x-number of years ago, that just can’t be!”
But sure enough, I count back the years, and I realize that it has indeed been that many years since I’ve seen so-and-so or done this-and-that. I feel that these occurrences pop up more frequently the older I become, granted, I haven’t experienced THAT much of life, but I have experienced enough to start talking about the years that have passed since significant life events. One of the biggest wake-up calls was when I would start conversing with people who were between the ages of 18 – 20, and then, to my demise, they would tell me that they had been born in early 2003. My loosely veiled ignorance about what year it actually was would come crashing down, and there would be a moment where my breath would catch, and I would wonder how it wasn’t still 2008.
Anybody? I can’t be the lone person out there who has these types of experiences.
The concept of time, especially for humans, is quite intriguing. Sure, we’ve extended our longevity with modern medicine and a better diet (well – maybe generally; I’m pretty sure my cake once a day keeps the doctor at bay is a fallacy, but that hasn’t been scientifically proven), but in the grand scheme of things, some have come before us, and there are those that will follow us. For many of us and the entirety of our lives, we will flow through time. Time will dictate our meetings, our planners, what time our kid has soccer practice, what time we “should” go to bed, or what time our favorite show will grace that TV screen sitting in our living room (although I might be dating myself because now that Hulu, Netflix, etc., exist, I haven’t had to wait for an episode to “drop” in years – unless you consider Stranger Things, which doesn’t even release on a weekly schedule anyway).
When is the last time you have felt “unhindered” by time?
If I’m being honest, it’s been a while for me. Vast portions of my life have been ruled by deadlines and time constraints. But something that I have realized is that when it comes to time, I am WAY out of my depth.
It’s not often that I like to think about my mortality. But the fact is, I will live, and then someday, I will leave this earthly life. My body will decay in the earth, and I will, eventually, once again become the dust that I was originally formed from. Personally, I am voting for a Viking-esque funeral where someone shoots a flaming arrow onto a funeral pyre in the middle of the ocean, but I hope I have some time to iron out the details before that happens.
One of the reasons I think that I have chewed on this “time” premise for the last couple of years is because I have been surrounded by entities that have dwarfed me on “the timeline.” When I lived in Germany, some of the houses would read, “erbaut 1585,” which means that the house had originally been built in 1585. Sure, it had gone through some *minor* renovations since then, but the fact remained that the house had been built before the foundation of the colonial United States. Almost 200 years before.
This year, I have been able to work with corals on the Caribbean side of Panama, which historically speaking, most hearty coral reefs are between 5,000 – 10,000 years old. * The coral reefs on the Caribbean side of Panama started growing after the Panamanian Isthmus formed, uniting the North American and South American landmasses. This formation allowed for the establishment of the Caribbean current, which in turn, led to high benthic and bottom-living diversity (i.e., corals, sea stars, urchins, etc.). The separation of the Caribbean from the Pacific Ocean by the Panamanian Isthmus created two very distinct ecosystems. One characterized by coral reefs, stable high temperatures, and lower nutrients on the Caribbean side, and the other dominated by a high diversity of pelagic organisms or organisms that move within the water column (i.e., whale sharks, fish, dolphins, etc.) on the Pacific side. The Pacific side is also high in nutrients and lower in temperature compared to the warm Caribbean. Today, coral reefs worldwide hold most of the biodiversity in our oceans.
The formation of these reefs didn’t happen on any human timescale. When I look at some of the coral that I am studying today, I am humbled by how small I really am. I am also humbled by the amount of relative power that I can hold compared to something that could be colloquially classified as a “dinosaur” (no, I’m not talking about you dad, although I have used that line before).
This coral has probably supported life for 15 times the amount at least that I have been sucking oxygen out of the atmosphere on this earth, yet I am the one who has scientifically pulled it out of the ocean to study the many mysteries that still exist in our human understanding of the world. This coral, ecologically, cannot move, cannot defend itself against an organism like myself, but it has been the bedrock of this tropical ecosystem for more years than I am probably willing to count in my head. This coral has supported life that I have never even dreamed of. Countless turtles and fish have swum through this coral and used its structure to protect their young. More urchins have found their homes in the crevices that bouldering corals create, and cushion sea stars have slowly marauded their way through the surrounding turtle grass in search of their next meal.
Something that has been “unhindered” by my human definition of time, and I have been the one to potentially end its living time on earth. That thought has given me a graver understanding of my role in time and how I treat organisms that have been here much longer than I have and will hopefully be here long after I am gone.
I have also become more grateful for the time that I have. I get to be a part of this moment in the “timeline” of things. In many ways, I have had to come to terms with the fact that I am a part of this story. I am not the story. I am a part of a much bigger story that is much grander than I, more complex, and more beautiful than I can possibly wrap my brain around.
Sometimes, I’ll admit, I wish I would feel unhindered and unburdened by time. Like a coral reef, simply take my time to do my thing. You know, breathe, grow, reproduce, breathe, grow, support life, little stuff like that. And maybe that’s something that I will try to let go of. Stepping out of the yoke of time and being. Being grateful, being conscious of how my actions impact others in this world, including the coral reef around me.
All in all, I’m not entirely sure where this blog post was going, but I do know that I am never quite the same after writing these. I know these posts are supposed to be so I can keep people up to date on my adventures and what I am learning, but they are for me too. They usually start as one thing but can shape into many different forms that always leave something with me.
So. Here’s to being mindful of time, learning to be unburdened, honoring the power we hold over things that are much more ancient than we are, and being humbled that we are a piece in the puzzle, not the puzzle and how that is not a bad thing.
Until next time,
your friendly neighborhood female scientist.
Fun fact: The uniting of North America and South America via the Isthmus created something called the Great American Biotic Interchange. This interchange acted like a highway, especially for megafauna (in this case, large mammals) to travel between the two land masses. For example, members of the bear and horse family, while originating in the north, were able to travel southward, and members of the anteater and sloth family were able to move northward from the south.
Fun fact II: Coral reefs directly add $30 billion annually to the global economy, the vast majority going to benefit people through food resources, jobs, and support of livelihoods. *
Animal of the week: American Pygmy Kingfisher (Chloroceryle aenea)
Photo credit: Jan Sarapak
Resources at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
*As always, a huge shoutout to Elizabeth Zerrien, who made this blog possible in the first place!*
Comments