Novella

Time is funny. You know. It seems like just yesterday when the children were toddlers, and yet, it feels like a long time ago, too. I finished Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman in almost no time, mostly because it's very short.

Each of thirty short chapters describes a dream that Einstein could have had about his theory of relativity. Unnamed characters in a German town go about their daily lives, but not in the ways we think are usual. Some people are stuck in one time, some move at lightning speed, some repeat fragments of time.

These dreams not only explore ideas of physical time, but also have spiritual connotations. I especially enjoyed the dream of 24 April 1905.

"In this world, there are two times. There is mechanical time and there is body time. The first is a rigid and metallic as a massive pendulum of iron that swings back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. The second squirms and wriggles like a bluefish in a bay. ... Many are convinced that mechanical time does not exist. ... They feel the rhythms and moods of their desires. Such people eat when they are hungry, go to their jobs at the millinery or the chemist's whenever they wake from their sleep ... Then there are those who think their bodies don't exist. They live by mechanical time. They rise at seven o'clock in the morning. They eat their lunch at noon and their supper at six. ... They know that the body is not a thing of wild magic, but a collection of chemicals, tissues and nerve impulses. ... Each time is true, but the truths are not the same."