Opplevelse av natur og tid i hverdagslivet

Sammendrag

Everyday lives are characterized by the so-called time bind, at least in post industrial societies. Hence we tend to strive to earn moments that are exempted from the mechanical clock and calendar time. Based on a qualitative case study from the Norwegian rural town of Brumunddal, on the use and experiences of nature areas near people's homes, we argue in this article that a relief from the time bind is found in concrete and dynamic experiences of time in nature. Often this seems to occur when we, for instance by taking a short evening walk, relate ourselves to nature and its inimitable rhythms and processes of durations. In order to frame the informants empirical interpretations of the relation between time and nature, we bring together some central aspects of the positions of Maurice Merleau-Ponty  - that the body subject incarnates experiences, and of Henri Bergson - that time should be understood as concrete durations, seeing that conceptualizations of the intuitive in human experience makes the two perspectives intersect at some central points. It is concluded that when engaging ourselves with nature, time can be experienced in a holistic and relational manner, and thus - in contrast to chronological time - as situational, dynamic and changeable.