The Acceleration of Everyday Life

"Wink of an Eye" is a third season episode of the original “Star Trek” series. The Enterprise responds to a distress signal sent from a planet in the outer quadrant they are exploring. Captain Kirk and landing party beam down to investigate.  

There they discover on the planet an elegant, but empty metropolis.  The only hint of life is the occasional, irritating buzz of unseen insects in their ears.

 After a wide search of the area fails to uncover anything, Kirk orders the landing party to return to the Enterprise.

Once aboard however, strange things begin to happen as equipment fails and ship systems become erratic. The strange buzzing of insects encountered on the planet, is now heard aboard the ship.

Kirk puts the ship on full alert, and while taking a sip of coffee on the bridge, he abruptly notices that the movements of the bridge crew seem to slow down to a stop as if time itself is being manipulated.  
 
Kirk soon figures out that the bridge crew has not slowed down, but he has been sped up, having been matched to the invading alien’s "hyper-accelerated" physical existence.  The strange buzzing is the hyper-accelerated reality of the aliens, that exist outside normal definitions.

We live today in the wink of an eye. That buzzing presence you hear in your brain and feel in your gut is the accelerated world of everyday life. It forces us to live outside of normal definitions and comfort zones. It’s amazing how fast things are altered in our lives today, and how ethereal our familiar world quickly becomes.