So beautiful Jason! You always write beautifully, but I particularly connect with your Antarctic pieces. Thanks for a nice distraction from the “real” world. Feeling the southern pull.
Thanks, Rebecca. It's nice to have some Antarctic cold to hold on to amid the heat, isn't it? And we both know that it's more real down there than the real world...
Loved reading this. BEautifully written. And loved reading the comments. Time is such a strange concept, isn't it?
From Wikipedia: ''Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. ''
I wrote a poem about time last year. Posted it up here on Substack awhile ago. Just about a particular time, while out with my grandkids. Time seems to go faster the older we get, don't you think?
I can't imagine living in Antarctica. It seems so desolate, and frightening (to me).
''The loose stitches time takes to unite our warm bodies are unraveled by this cold. And yet, somehow, the substance of cold is the substance of time.'' I love this so much. (For some very odd reason, reading your essay made me cry...or maybe it was reading it while listening to very soulful music or maybe it was the ticking of the clock next to my desk.) Thank you Jason for this piece.
Thank you, Jeannine. Yes, our ideas and perception of time are strange in so many ways. And yes, it certainly moves much faster as we age. The decades seem to move by like years now.
Antarctica is desolate, absolutely, but the beauty is so extraordinary that it draws us out of ourselves. Or it did for me, at least.
It seems like an incredible place to be. And a very cold place to be!! I'm curious Jason, about the sounds. What did you hear while walking around out there on the ice and snow?
Jason, thank you for your lived experience and work on this issue. I particularly appreciate the way we are drawn into the essence of your experience and then you fold in the dire details.
That’s a way of writing that I find challenging — when I really want to ask the reader (and myself) to pause, figure out a plan and ration or whatever it takes!
Mostly the sound of wind across the snow, and whatever noises we were making. If it was windless, and I was being quiet, it was about as close to silence as you can find outside, a silence that matched the view.
I've recently come to realize that sound(s) is/are very important to me. Odd that! So, because of your post here, I did some research and found this on the 'The Importance of sound in today's world: promoting best practices' on the UNESCO digital library site! ''(a) The sound environment reflects and shapes our individual and collective behaviour, and our productivity and capacity to live in harmony together. Giving more importance to sound-related issues in our increasingly noisy world has thus become a vital matter. ''
Wow! The silence must have been 'deafening' in Antartica! We never really experience 'true' silence, there is always a motor of some sort running somewhere in our houses, be it fridge, air conditioners, heating systems, etc. Or even the noise of traffic outdoors, birds (lovely noise), wind in the branches, etc. seem to always be there in the background!
Thankyou, Jason for sharing about your work in Antarctica and answering my question on sound. It is quite fascinating.
Of course, Jeannine. Sound is a vital part of our relationship with the real world. We make too much of it everywhere now, too much for us and for other species. Road noise is a particular problem, altering the lives of wildlife across the globe. I did a three part piece on our noise in the oceans too.
“The shards of time zones around the South Pole notwithstanding, time finds few handholds here. Timelessness surrounds us in a landscape defined by a continuum of unframed moments. In the interior, I feel no story, no beginning or end.”
Although I have many favorite quotes, this one takes the top spot. The entire piece is beautifully written, Jason.
Although when I read the first paragraph, I wished this was an audio that I could listen to while I walked the steep hills of the NEK, keeping an eye out for the next shady spot, whether it is from a tree canopy or telephone pole (I am thin enough to walk in it’s shadow, if I walk kind of side ways). No doubt even your words could cool me, but the thought of snow and whiteout storms and glaciers a world away, was helpful . It is steamy hot and the air is still stifled by smoke particles from Canada.
Thank you, Lor. That's high praise. It did occur to me that writing about a world of ice right now would be helpful for someone coping with the heat and smoke. As for audio, I had a moment in this Field Guide process where I finally got around to recording a few of the essays, but I didn't like the result and felt like the effort wasn't worth it. I can't decide if that was the right call, but it was certainly the easier one...
Stick to those trees and telephone poles. September is just around the corner.
Thanks, Nicholas. As a side note, that fossil was key in the initial understanding of continental drift/plate tectonics. It wouldn't have been a species that moved around the globe easily, but it was found in the Antarctic, South Africa, South America, etc, suggesting that the continents all fit together at some point.
The details and nuances of a place brought out in the light. From understanding time - as a clock of use, as the age of ice, as a meteorite - to the solitude of location that is not really isolated. Thank you for a glimpse into the experience.
Thank you, Stacy. I try to make my particular Antarctic experience shareable, but it's a lot of strange words about a strange place. I'm glad it made some sense to you.
Amazingly beautiful writing. I was swept away by it, transported by it and coming out to the other part of this writing, the section of cites as interesting and useful as they always are, was like regretfully returning to a narrower and dryer land. Time is the central mystery for me.
Philosophers say that time is intimate to change: one cannot arise without the other. But what is not spoken of is the great land itself, the desert places either of sand or ice, and how they hold time, change, and our imagination in their numinous hands. They actually are life-giving, those places and the longer we are away from them the more quickly we age.
Thanks, Michael. It's heartening as always to have you out there as wrapped in the physical mystery of time as I am. Or more, I think. The land holds all the visible signs of passing time and yet is, in total, the clearest sign that time is more circular than narrative.
You might be intrigued by this recent hypothesis in physics that time has three dimensions and space is merely a byproduct. I don't have the foggiest idea what that means but I like the sound of it.
I have to agree with Michael above. I was so entranced that I could almost feel time slow as I read it. Deep time has always fascinated me, as has deep space. Maybe it's because of the immense, the unfathomable, limitless reaches they represent. I can't imagine what it's like to stand on a beach and know as I look inland that there's essentially nothing for a thousand miles.
Thanks very much. I'm really glad that time slowed as you read. And yes, that cognitive awe that comes from really understanding the scale of the Antarctic emptiness can be overwhelming. Similar I imagine when far out to sea. It's hard to hide in our little worlds when we know what surrounds them...
So beautiful Jason! You always write beautifully, but I particularly connect with your Antarctic pieces. Thanks for a nice distraction from the “real” world. Feeling the southern pull.
Thanks, Rebecca. It's nice to have some Antarctic cold to hold on to amid the heat, isn't it? And we both know that it's more real down there than the real world...
Loved reading this. BEautifully written. And loved reading the comments. Time is such a strange concept, isn't it?
From Wikipedia: ''Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. ''
I wrote a poem about time last year. Posted it up here on Substack awhile ago. Just about a particular time, while out with my grandkids. Time seems to go faster the older we get, don't you think?
I can't imagine living in Antarctica. It seems so desolate, and frightening (to me).
''The loose stitches time takes to unite our warm bodies are unraveled by this cold. And yet, somehow, the substance of cold is the substance of time.'' I love this so much. (For some very odd reason, reading your essay made me cry...or maybe it was reading it while listening to very soulful music or maybe it was the ticking of the clock next to my desk.) Thank you Jason for this piece.
Thank you, Jeannine. Yes, our ideas and perception of time are strange in so many ways. And yes, it certainly moves much faster as we age. The decades seem to move by like years now.
Antarctica is desolate, absolutely, but the beauty is so extraordinary that it draws us out of ourselves. Or it did for me, at least.
It seems like an incredible place to be. And a very cold place to be!! I'm curious Jason, about the sounds. What did you hear while walking around out there on the ice and snow?
Jason, thank you for your lived experience and work on this issue. I particularly appreciate the way we are drawn into the essence of your experience and then you fold in the dire details.
That’s a way of writing that I find challenging — when I really want to ask the reader (and myself) to pause, figure out a plan and ration or whatever it takes!
Well done. Kudos.🌱🌿💚
Mostly the sound of wind across the snow, and whatever noises we were making. If it was windless, and I was being quiet, it was about as close to silence as you can find outside, a silence that matched the view.
I've recently come to realize that sound(s) is/are very important to me. Odd that! So, because of your post here, I did some research and found this on the 'The Importance of sound in today's world: promoting best practices' on the UNESCO digital library site! ''(a) The sound environment reflects and shapes our individual and collective behaviour, and our productivity and capacity to live in harmony together. Giving more importance to sound-related issues in our increasingly noisy world has thus become a vital matter. ''
Wow! The silence must have been 'deafening' in Antartica! We never really experience 'true' silence, there is always a motor of some sort running somewhere in our houses, be it fridge, air conditioners, heating systems, etc. Or even the noise of traffic outdoors, birds (lovely noise), wind in the branches, etc. seem to always be there in the background!
Thankyou, Jason for sharing about your work in Antarctica and answering my question on sound. It is quite fascinating.
Of course, Jeannine. Sound is a vital part of our relationship with the real world. We make too much of it everywhere now, too much for us and for other species. Road noise is a particular problem, altering the lives of wildlife across the globe. I did a three part piece on our noise in the oceans too.
Oh wow! Have you posted it up here on Substack? I will look for it!
“The shards of time zones around the South Pole notwithstanding, time finds few handholds here. Timelessness surrounds us in a landscape defined by a continuum of unframed moments. In the interior, I feel no story, no beginning or end.”
Although I have many favorite quotes, this one takes the top spot. The entire piece is beautifully written, Jason.
Although when I read the first paragraph, I wished this was an audio that I could listen to while I walked the steep hills of the NEK, keeping an eye out for the next shady spot, whether it is from a tree canopy or telephone pole (I am thin enough to walk in it’s shadow, if I walk kind of side ways). No doubt even your words could cool me, but the thought of snow and whiteout storms and glaciers a world away, was helpful . It is steamy hot and the air is still stifled by smoke particles from Canada.
And you, stick to what’s easier, you work hard enough just gathering information, not to mention writing about it.
Thank you, Lor. That's high praise. It did occur to me that writing about a world of ice right now would be helpful for someone coping with the heat and smoke. As for audio, I had a moment in this Field Guide process where I finally got around to recording a few of the essays, but I didn't like the result and felt like the effort wasn't worth it. I can't decide if that was the right call, but it was certainly the easier one...
Stick to those trees and telephone poles. September is just around the corner.
The bit about the Glossopteris is especially good imo.
Thanks, Nicholas. As a side note, that fossil was key in the initial understanding of continental drift/plate tectonics. It wouldn't have been a species that moved around the globe easily, but it was found in the Antarctic, South Africa, South America, etc, suggesting that the continents all fit together at some point.
The details and nuances of a place brought out in the light. From understanding time - as a clock of use, as the age of ice, as a meteorite - to the solitude of location that is not really isolated. Thank you for a glimpse into the experience.
Thank you, Stacy. I try to make my particular Antarctic experience shareable, but it's a lot of strange words about a strange place. I'm glad it made some sense to you.
Amazingly beautiful writing. I was swept away by it, transported by it and coming out to the other part of this writing, the section of cites as interesting and useful as they always are, was like regretfully returning to a narrower and dryer land. Time is the central mystery for me.
Philosophers say that time is intimate to change: one cannot arise without the other. But what is not spoken of is the great land itself, the desert places either of sand or ice, and how they hold time, change, and our imagination in their numinous hands. They actually are life-giving, those places and the longer we are away from them the more quickly we age.
Thanks, Michael. It's heartening as always to have you out there as wrapped in the physical mystery of time as I am. Or more, I think. The land holds all the visible signs of passing time and yet is, in total, the clearest sign that time is more circular than narrative.
You might be intrigued by this recent hypothesis in physics that time has three dimensions and space is merely a byproduct. I don't have the foggiest idea what that means but I like the sound of it.
I have to agree with Michael above. I was so entranced that I could almost feel time slow as I read it. Deep time has always fascinated me, as has deep space. Maybe it's because of the immense, the unfathomable, limitless reaches they represent. I can't imagine what it's like to stand on a beach and know as I look inland that there's essentially nothing for a thousand miles.
Thanks very much. I'm really glad that time slowed as you read. And yes, that cognitive awe that comes from really understanding the scale of the Antarctic emptiness can be overwhelming. Similar I imagine when far out to sea. It's hard to hide in our little worlds when we know what surrounds them...