Time that doesn't rush.

"Time doesn't pass — we change in it."

There was a man who hadn't looked at his watch often for some time.

Not because he wasn't interested in time.

But because he noticed that the watch always showed the same thing, while something completely different was happening inside it.

He got up in the morning, did what he had to do.

Business, papers, responsibilities.

For others, these were days.

For him, they were more like weights that sometimes became lighter, sometimes heavier, regardless of what the calendar showed.

Someone once asked him:

- The end of the year is approaching. Don't you usually count? Don't you make a balance?

He thought about it.

He didn't answer right away.

He remembered that there were years when as much happened in a single day as in other months.

And there were periods when weeks passed with only fatigue growing, but time didn't move.

He realized that time doesn't always move forward.

Sometimes it stops.

Sometimes it contracts.

Other times it almost expands, and more life can fit into a single moment than in an entire year.

When he was a child, summer was endless.

A day seemed longer than a month now.

Later, the years sped up.

As if someone had fast-forwarded the film while he was still standing in the same scene.

Then something happened.

Not spectacular.

Not festive.

Just a realization.

That time doesn't live in a calendar.

But in a person.

Long in a wait.

Heavy in a loss.

Spacious in a hope.

Dense in a fear.

He realized that the New Year doesn't always begin in January.

Sometimes with a sentence.

Sometimes with a decision.

Sometimes with a silence when you no longer want to go on as you have been.

And he also realized that birthdays are not necessarily the measure of life.

Some people live many years, and some live a lot of time.

One can be counted.

The other cannot.

Since then, he has looked at days differently.

He did not ask what date it was.

He rather observed whether a day had left something in it or had just passed by.

And when another anniversary approached, he did not make a vow.

He did not write a list.

He only thought: maybe time does not move, only we move in it.

And maybe the question is not what day of the year it is, but where a person is now in himself.

At this point, he stopped.

Not because he was tired.

But because he felt that this thought did not need to be closed.

Time will continue anyway.

There is no need to hurry.

The thought has already started.

Whoever feels it will carry it on.