SANDS OF TIME . . . .

Sitting at Marine Drive, I gaze at the sky and the sea, and that perfect illusion of the horizon in between. A little street kid skips along and tries to clamber up but the parapet is too high for her. I pick her up and sit her down beside me. Her delighted grin lights me up. She has a perfectly ruined white rose in her grubby little hand and is now busy pulling off all it's petals and letting them drift into the breeze. I smile to myself as I think of the picture we are painting - Fluffy clouds strewn across a purple pink sky, the glittering sea ahead, and two strangers amongst a thousand others watching the golden sunset together.

I feel content. It is beguiling to simply sit here and enjoy the salt infused sea breeze and marvel at the vastness of the sight that I behold. There is always a moment here when time holds still and the grains of sand in the hourglass cease to drop. I close my eyes, tilt my head back and let the last rays of the setting sun soak my face. I know this is a cherished moment, bound to invoke nostalgia once it has passed.

As the sun sets, I think of the many moments of my life that have passed. The liaisons and transgressions that I've had, the misadventures I have embarked upon, the mundane that I have endured. I hope there is a cosmic entity up there witnessing the saga of my existence and imprinting it upon the universe. I want these moments to reverberate through time and space, the memories reflected in an ethereal looking glass. And at some infinite point of time, in some alternate universe, I want the sands of time to hold still again, so those luminous petals may drift back to me...