Passage of Time

In Ovid’s metamorphoses I feel that the strongest statement to describe the overall message of the book comes from Pythagoras. He says on page 520 “for all things flow; all things are born to change their shapes. And time itself is a river, on an endless course. I am pretty sure that people chose this as their favorite lines of the book for class discussion so I am not going to really dig into this quote to much, I just thought it would explain some of what I am going to talk about. What I want to talk about is Pythagoras’s idea of comparing a lifecycle to seasonal changes. I thought this was one of the most interesting concepts from the book because I have never really thought about a life from death to birth compared to spring, summer, fall and winter. When I first read this idea I really didn’t think about it too much because I was hung up on Pythagoras’s other philosophies on life. Reading over this again it started to make sense to me as one of the most truthful notions about life and the earth that I have ever read.

For me my philosophy on life is agreeable to Pythagoras’s; so when he talks about the earth being alive and bodies becoming other bodies it is almost like reading a factual text. Pythagoras describes the earth like a mother; a mother that gives life to all it’s creatures. It is through his description of springtime where we start to understand this as a truthful statement about mother earth. Spring is the season of newly born's and the first stage of life; like a womb the earth in the season of spring provides a budding seed with the sustenance to maintain life and let it grow. This season represents the first season of a child; it is the season of life where it is allowed to grow and be comforted by it’s mother. Summertime is the season of power in a human’s life. It is the season of strength and beauty. No longer needing the help of mother this is the season where young people are forced to decide for themselves and choose their own path in life. This is the most defining season in a human’s life. The season after summer is, as we all know autumn. This is the season in between youth and age it is also the season of mildness. For us it is the season of the dreaded middle aged. This is the season where we watch are hair like falling leaves disappear from our once beautiful head. We should not dread any of the seasons though; each serves as a purpose life. The season of autumn is where we can still be what we once were but in a relaxed way. As autumn transcends into winter we finally come to old age. Old age is a time of wisdom but also a time of death what once were green robust leaves are now dead or white. This season seems like a time of hopelessness. What were once young vibrant people are now just relics of what they once were. This though is not a depressing time. We have to remember old age is just a period of time before metamorphoses. The quote I choose at the beginning of the blog I feel is a beautiful representation of the notion of bodies becoming other bodies. We should not fear death, because in all its feared blackness a sun will rise on a beautiful spring day