time flies

time flies
also, how time flies

Meaning

• for a particular phase in life to seem shorter than it really was
• to feel like the good part of life is getting over in a speedy manner
• to be reminiscing/missing the past
• used as a remark that time seems to elapse very fast

Example Sentences

1. Time flies when I go to play with friends.
2. She is my favourite teacher and time flies when she teaches English in the class.
3. The kids are all grown up and ready to move out of my house, time flies!
4. I never knew how time flies until I contracted this dreadful disease.
5. You won't even get to know how time flies when you have joined your job again.
6. It is seriously a mystery how time flies and that we have all become graduates today.
7. My mother did not know how time flies all the while she was a working in my father's manufacturing unit.

Origin

Most probably, this idiom was originated as “tempus fugit” in the Latin language in “The Georgics” a poem written by a Latin poet Virgil, likely published in 29 BC. It has later been converted to an English phrase.

The phrase is rationally not accurate since time does not really fly. This phrase refers to the action of birds, that is flying, and how they are visible to people one second and gone the next. The phrase sees time in a similar manner, where it is gone before the person realizes. This is a common phenomenon especially when the times are good. Usually bad times last longer than they actually do.