Mineral deposits in caves can contain rich data sets on past environmental conditions. But chemical information in water and minerals often takes a long time to travel from Earth’s surface and into caves, where they then slowly solidify as stalagmites and other forms of speleothems. This often results in a time lag of several decades between a climate event and its recording within a cave structure. In this session recorded during Unearthing the Present, participants take the stratigraphic research in Ernesto Cave, Italy, as a literal and metaphorical starting point to explore possibilities of reconfiguration and reconciliation of the conflicting temporalities of the Anthropocene. How can we conceive a truly planetary time? Is decelerating a viable strategy for gaining time? Or should we rather make efforts to turn the time of confusion and collapse into a time of potential and renewal?