Where Does the Time Go?

Ward, Colorado, does not have a proud history. It sits 9400 feet in the air, not far from the Great Divide, and the wind truly does come whistling down the borderline. All the time. It takes a low country horse months to adjust to the altitude. It took me longer than that.

Hazel was not only the BF's employer, she was our landlord. She owned the shack with the newspaper insulation, the ill-fitting windows and the minimally functional woodstove, with a firebox about big enough to heat and cook with toothpicks. If we'd taken time to think about it, we might have noticed that she owned our lives for as long as we stayed in her house, in her town. Instead, we were busy sorting out how to be mountain folk.

It wasn't that Hazel demanded much of us. She led a very solitary life. She kept her lights on all night long and seemed to subsist on peppermint ribbon candy, except for when she sedately drove her red Jeep Wagoneer down the canyon, into Boulder. Then she would eat at McDonald's. Her trips into town rarely involved buying groceries.The BF took to riding along with her on the Boulder trips, to meet the guys at the lumberyard or pick up a clutch of tools. Or maybe just for company and the McDonald's lunch: something he would have disdained in California.

Hazel liked to hike up in the Brainard Lake State Forest meadows, when she had time. She was a botanist extraordinaire, never missing a tiny alpine flower, hiding its light under a rock, and knowing exactly where and when to find the elusive columbine. She hiked with a magnifiying lens and she liked people along on the hikes. That's where we got to observe her sleeping habits. After walking a quarter mile, she'd sit down beside a warm rock and nod off for ten or fifteen minutes. She'd wake, refreshed and take another catnap half an hour later. We surmised that she did not sleep at night.

The thing I remember most vividly about Hazel is her relationship with time. She frequently remarked that she didn't have time to do something. As her life wasn't complicated with family or work or social commitments, it was hard to determine what was clogging her schedule. But now I am beginning to understand.

It's not about how much time there is in a day. It's not about keeping a calendar. It is about psychic time: what you need for yourself, what you have available to spend on others. Just like Hazel, I have fewer things than ever claiming my attention and less time to spare on things that must be scheduled. The more time I spend alone, the less I am inclined to sacrifice my solitude. I wonder if this would be true if I'd never known Hazel.