Collapsing Timelines and Other Curious Phenomena

"The sun was shining on the sea, shining with all his might....and this was odd, because it was the middle of the night." ~Lewis Carroll

Not too long ago my friend Maura called asking me to meet her at a tucked away stretch of beach on the north shore of the island. "The timelines are collapsing," she said. "Bring cake."

Bare feet in the sand, we walked the long, empty stretch of Mae Haad toward Koh Ma--a sometimes island, sometimes peninsula depending on how high or low the tide is. On that particular day, at that particular hour the tide was so low we could walk all the way to the small island.

From across the sandbar, the overgrown, dense jungle didn't seem penetrable. But as we approached, a rocky path appeared that lead us along the edge of long ago abandoned jungle huts etched into a hillside. Dilapidated, graffitied, abandoned huts choked by vines and smothered by dead fallen palm fronds.

Eyes wide and drinking in the surroundings, we were two children loose on a deserted, tropical island having adventures, traipsing through the jungle to find treasures. The only things missing were our khakis, fedoras, and bullwhips. All my childhood dreams come true.

We poked around the remnants of what looked to have been a reception area or maybe a swim up bar--which was odd because at low tide the ocean waters didn't come anywhere near the structure. Shattered porcelain and coconut husks lay at our feet, and through crumbled concrete, small vines and flowers emerged. Energetically magical and ominous, light and dark, alive and dead. The longer we lingered the stranger it got. Probable timeline, Maura whispered. A chill ran up my spine. I glanced back over my shoulder to make sure the path was still there.

Our conversation meandered around esoteric theories and blurred realities, but it always lead back to the collapsing timelines. Amidst a global phenomenon, people are not just having different experiences--they are experiencing different realities, conflicting ones. Each reality existing in a surreal bubble that doesn't just brush against the others, but spills over into them, tangled and contradictory, creating a strange friction--like a bad Sci-Fi story with too many plot lines going at once.

In other words, our everyday observational world slipped from one of classical physics to quantum mechanics--a world based on uncertainty, fluidity, and probability. Everything is and isn't all at once. All potential possibilities slipping in and out of each other, each as true as they are untrue. A surreal perspective outside of time and space. The implications chilling and exciting.

Heading back toward Mae Haad, I stopped as we passed the eerily, empty hillside of huts and listened. When confronted with what no longer exists, collapsing timelines, and splintered realities, you can't simply listen with only your five senses. Everything becomes an extension of you. Feel into that. Soak up the stories. Imagination stems from where we put our attention, after all. 

As we made our way back across the sandbar and the long, empty stretch of Mae Haad, a storm brewed in the distance. Dark clouds hung over the sea. We paused and watched in awe as the storm moved across the gulf, over the scattering of fishing boats, barreling toward us, charging the atmosphere with surrealism and electricity.

Lifetimes of factors set our souls in motion to put us exactly where we are meant to be at this time and place, to align with a specific timeline, to have specific experiences. Move with awareness and caution through this wilderness. What are you exposing yourself to these days? How are you reacting to your environment, to all the input? What timeline are you gravitating toward?