experience of being alive. I was not willing time to pass, but in its impish way, it was running too fast for me. Time is a demon. It senses our feelings and acts contrarily to our desires. I had felt the years pass too quickly of late, now that I had discovered a reason to live. The many years of pointless existence had passed so slowly. Time was definitely asymmetric. It flowed in one direction but it also acted contrarily to expectation. This aspect of time was not something I had not realised before. Was this another insight?
On the horizon, the tall peak of the island had become visible. Had it been there all along and not been noticed? I knew it was only just over ten miles from shore, so it must have been visible. Perhaps the boat had changed course. I looked back at the wake and saw that the track disappeared almost as soon as it was made. The tumult of the water destroyed the past. If it were a calm day the wake would be visible for miles. Histories are lost in turbulent times. Perhaps that is why we know so much about Greek culture. True there were the many wars, but there was comparative peace too. Funnily, eventually all histories will be lost if one thinks of it. The march of time has been likened to the increase in entropy. Does entropy exist as a objective reality or is it a scientific fantasy? The scientist posits entropy as the ever increasing complexity of existence - akin to a decreasing state of knowledge of the overall state of a system. The supposed ultimate state for the universal system is one of infinite entropy, or conversely, minimal knowledge. So, on a cosmic timescale, we are forgetting our past, or rather we are losing our past. A cosmological Alzheimer's disease!
We are forgetting our past inexorably. What does that mean for the infamous quantum field theory of the sum or superposition of all possible histories making up reality? A curious idea I could never really understand. Good old Schr?dinger's cat facing a random future in a closed box - is it both dead and alive? The quantum theorist says that it is in a superposition of both states, in a probabilistic sense. Some maintain that the cat has both existences - is dead in one world and alive in another! But if knowledge of our histories is decaying in the entropic sense, then surely, reality is decaying. Is the end of the universe the end of reality? Perhaps, another insight.
The island was now fully visible and the sight of it helped raise everyone's spirits. It rose conically from the grey waves to a towering height. At its base what seemed like millions of gulls flew in the air streams created by the sheer cliffs guarding the shore. There the waves were white and frothy and ominously dangerous. The boat, keeping a safe distance from the hazardous rocks, circled the southern shore of the island. It seemed incredible that this tiny craft could find a safe landing on the treacherous shoreline.
But the skipper was all the while unperturbed, puffing on a soggy cigarette and gesticulating with his free hand, pointing out a sea arch, or one of the many sea stacks that littered the shoreline. The gulls had gone into a frenzy at the approach of the boat to the island. They dived at the stern and swooped away in steep wide arcs, their cries filling the air. I felt elated at the scene. This was real life at its best - being tossed on the waves in a tiny craft, at the mercy of the sea, in the shadow of an ancient island, and under the constant attention of thousands of flying creatures. How could my sum of histories add up to this special moment?
I closed my eyes and went into a deep state of peace. I took off on a voyage backward in time from that point, stopping off at only the seminal moments - those that were etched indelibly onto my sub-conscious mind. I flew swiftly past the years of professional work and rearing of family. My first landing was far back in childhood - perhaps I was about ten or eleven years old.
The feeling came back as if it never left me. Wellingtons on and duffel coat fastened, I headed out into the heavy rain, my hand in the coat pocket clutching the small bird book given to me by my best friend. It was the first birthday present I had ever got, and thereafter, no present could ever live up to it. So as I stole out of the house, unobserved. I knew I was setting off on an experience that was to be very special. It was the first time I had the opportunity to use the bird book.
Up to then I had little interest in birds but yet had a romantic idea of the pastime of bird watching. Locked into this view was the possibility of escape from the reality of my own life, with its unhappy family environment and poor circumstances. I saw, in becoming a birdwatcher, an avenue in to the world of some of the characters I'd read about in children's books. I fantasised about the world of the Secret Seven or the Hardy Boys, and found my own life to be dull in comparison to the adventurous lives they perpetually led. I developed a deep longing for adventure and mystery in my life, but the life of small town West of Ireland provided no such drama. The drama it provided was anything but adventurous - it was sordid and horribly real - not the clean wholesome bit of smuggling or whatever of the Hardy boys.
I had somehow identified bird watching as being associated with this fantasy life, and hence my latent interest in birds. This was very unusual at the time when most boys, if they saw a bird, would reach into their pocket and take out their catapult. Dead or wounded birds were interesting to them, or perhaps robbing bird's nests, but just looking at them would have caused malicious laughter and jeering. So my interest was definitely against the grain.
My best friend was more one to use a catapult in his interactions with birds - and he had quite a good shot too - but somehow he understood my need to look at birds, and when he produced the present for my birthday, I was very surprised.
We were inseparable as friends, going everywhere together, but the exchange of gifts was not the done thing amongst boys. For that reason I was embarrassed by his offering and quickly put it away lest other boys notice and start to jeer. When I got home later that evening, I spent hours leafing through its coloured pages. I couldn't wait for morning, to go out and do some bird watching. Then, I would be like those children in my books, and maybe adventure might soon follow.
But the morning was another of those dreary wet cold days. The rain was coming down in buckets. I stared out the window for ages, hoping it would clear, but eventually I realized that it there for the day. Undeterred, I put on my Wellington boots and coat, tucked the book into the deep pocket, and without a word to anyone, just headed out. I had no plan of where to go but made my way downtown and turned left towards the Abbey cemetery. The cemetery ran alongside a pedestrian walkway that straddled a small river for about a half mile. I reckoned there could be some bird life there, but the rain seemed to have made all birds take shelter. I was disappointed and disillusioned. This was a poor start to my entry into a new adventurous world.
I followed the walkway towards the railway end. Thereafter it cut back towards the town. This territory was all very familiar to me. It was remarkable how free we were back then. From an early age, the whole town and its environs were our playground. Apart from certain areas where we knew that, if we entered, we were under threat from enemy gangs, we were safe in the familiarity of being on our own turf. But the striking thing was that, beyond certain points, we did not stray. Outside these limits was a world unexplored and even mysterious. We were no longer on familiar ground. One such limit was at the railway end of the walk. Here we normally took the right turn that brought us back to town. The river dipped left, under the road, and headed south to the rear of the railway, off into the unknown.
I stood in the pouring rain at the railway exit, and my hand still on the book, I turned south towards the unknown. My heart was starting to thump, as I realized the decision I had made. I had decided to strike out - to push forward the boundaries of my existence. I was taking control of my life, perhaps for the first time. I had made a decision to go and search for adventure, rather than wait for it to come to me. A curious feeling of well-being engulfed me. I was at peace with the world. I didn't mind the rain or the mud at my feet. I was following my own path. I found again the river bank, which was now just passing through flat fields. I walked along, happy in the knowledge that this was all new. I did not know where it led t
o, but I now never had to worry about getting lost, either.
Eventually I stopped and took up position in some bushes and started to bird watch. The rain still came down in sheets and the bushes provided no shelter. The bushes were to be my camouflage, to conceal my presence from the birds. I crouched among the bushes and remained absolutely still. Time passed. I had no watch but I had no need to tell the hour. I was so content. There was silence except for the noise of the rain on the leaves and stream. The heavy swollen river moved slowly, its muddy waters flowing in the direction away from town. I threw a twig into the current and watched it float away and knew that its journey would take it to places, that someday, I would explore.
All day, I spent there, in the rain, my hand in my pocket protecting the bird book that never had to be opened. No bird appeared that day. I never got to identify the beautiful kingfisher or the elusive bittern. But I had identified something in myself. I cannot, to this day, say what it was, but it generated a feeling that, ever since, I have had only fleeting recurrences of. Maybe it was the feeling of