I’ve started examining benches.
Not to sit on them.
To determine whether they are, in fact, benches
or time machines pretending to be benches.
That’s a bench.
You can tell because it’s uncomfortable in a very present-day way.
That’s a time machine.
It’s trying too hard to look like a bench.
No normal bench has that level of confidence.
Now this one is interesting,
because it is a bench,
but it was installed in 1987
and has not moved on emotionally yet.
So physically a bench, temporally a hostage situation.
At first glance this appears to be a time machine,
but it’s actually just a modern art bench,
which means no one can tell what it is,
including the designer.
So it is neither bench nor time machine.
It is a grant.
This is a person sitting very still on a bench
hoping I will classify them as furniture.
They are not a bench.
They are also not a time machine.
Unless they regret their life choices,
in which case they are attempting to go back 20 minutes.
Now this one is clearly a time machine,
because it makes you think about every conversation you’ve ever had
while waiting for someone who said “I’m five minutes away.”
That’s temporal distortion.
This is a plaque dedicated to a bench that used to be here.
So it is a memorial to sitting.
You cannot sit on it,
which makes it the ghost of a bench.
Not a time machine,
but it does deal heavily in the past.
In conclusion, the world is full of benches.
Some of them are benches. Some of them are time machines.
And some of them are things we will never fully understand, but will cautiously sit near anyway.
So next time you see a bench, ask yourself one simple question:
“Is this for resting, or am I about to become historically relevant?”