The Haunting Concept of the Glowing Globe Moments –or- What Would Happen If All 6.76 Billion Of Us Jumped, Laughed, Or Breathed In At The Same Time?

My sweaty kid-hands, with dry play-do under the fingernails, plug in a globe and turn the switch on the cord two clicks. It lights up! In my mind, I ponder the alliterative, Seuss-like concept of a “glowing globe”, even though I have no idea what pondering or alliterations are. Kids toys, educational or not, should not be difficult to adjust or operate. But this is 1989; Lincoln Logs give splinters and eerie rumors fly around about kids accidently killing themselves with Tinker Toys. This globe is no exception. It has an adjustable eyepiece attached to the globe’s arm, and the eyepiece takes all of the strength that can be mustered from scrawny, kid forearms to move. Carefully, I spin the globe and line the eyepiece up with any number of clear dots sprinkled across the continents and islands of Planet Earth. At every spot, I close my left eye and press the socket of my right eye into the eyepiece with enough force to leave circular indentions around my eye when I finally pulled away. For each spot, I peered through the eyepiece to see pictures of this part and that part of Planet Earth. Some pictures with people, some with animals, some with buildings, some with scenic nature shots, some with everything. Some things I recognized, and some were completely new.
Assumption and imagination are hard to tell apart as a kid, but I always assumed or imagined that the pictures inside the eyepiece of the different places on Planet Earth were all taken at the same time. I have no idea why I thought this, but it made a lot of sense to me at the time. I didn’t have a real adequate knowledge of the kind of coordination that would take among so many individuals, nor did I understand the intricacies of photography enough to determine otherwise. So as far as I was concerned, what I saw was a snapshot of the same moment, around the Planet Earth.
This idea haunts me to this day. Since childhood, I think I have thought in term of moments. I like to imagine those snapshots right now, across the hall, around the corner, on the other side of the world. Moments are different. Moments make histories, timelines, agendas, plans, calendars, and to do lists irrelevant. In fact, in terms of moments, those things almost seem funny, or at least ridiculously insignificant.
The haunting concept of the glowing globe moment has seeped its way into my approaches, philosophies, theologies, and ponderings and made itself at home amongst the clutter and confusion that’s accumulated there over the years.
It has made me a moment person.
A person for whom agendas, plans, and all of linear time take second stage to “the moment.” While it has its drawbacks (can only accurately remember about 10 important dates including holidays and birthdays, general confusion about time zones; specifically the changes between eastern time, pacific time, and central time, an inability to grapple with the concept of “falling back” or “springing forward”, and being perplexed enough about the sun rising in the east and setting in the west that I had to formulate a elaborate mnemonic device to remember it involving western movies and houses of prostitution in New Orleans; seriously), it also has its advantages.
Being a moment-person has made me aware of the potential value of what I do in any moment. I have an amazing choice each moment to establish what kind of moment it will be in the world when the snapshots are taken. I cannot afford to take a moment off. I have to be responsible with my parts of my moments and build my part of that moment with as much of what I think is good, and right, and hopeful.
So to all my moment-people—may we all do our best to treat each moment like it is important and worthy of being filled with the best things we know. Or in the oft-quoted words of a good friend; “Live. And Live Well. BREATHE. Breathe in and Breathe deeply. Be PRESENT. Do not be past. Do not be future. Be now.”