Lately I've found my mind returning again and again to the gulf between our human-centered perception of time, defined by our blink-of-the-eye lives, and the great expanse of time over eons. Yep, it seems like every time I stop halfway across my beloved Broadway bridge I end up trying to imagine what this stretch of river will look like in 500 or 5000 years. What will be left? The equivalent of smoldering ruins? Will we have recycled everything that stands today into something else during some time of great need? What sounds will echo across the valley? Will people still live here? Will their memory of this city --of cities-- have evolved into myth, like the travelers in Jim Crace's "The Pesthouse" who stumble upon what's left of a freeway in post-apocalypse America and try to connect what they're looking at to the stories handed down to them through generations? Will this place simply revert to the vast wilderness that it was only a very short time ago? I would give anything to be able to time travel into the future and see for myself.