Unstuck In Time

I was looking out today over one of the very fine views available for those with eyes to see at my place of work and thinking of an uncle of mine (by marriage) who died many years ago. He was extraordinarily tough and brave in a way that leaves one feeling dwarfed. He died a disappointed man following the loss of his son, my cousin, a boy in his teens, but led an accomplished life. He was regarded with something like awe in his extended family, many of whom owed their lives to him. Those were hard times for some people in some places, especially eastern Europe.

And I was thinking how strange it was that I should be looking out on a landscape utterly foreign to my uncle yet thinking of him, as if he were some kind of intruder upon the scene. And, of course, I was aware of myself as an intruder.

I couldn't put any of these thoughts coherently together, and it didn't seem of any importance at all to do so. We carry the past with us, and one day we will be part of it ourselves.