Maybe it's when it all goes calm and I stop and think about it that I realise. I miss that clock. That damn ticking sound. Infuriating as it was, driving me mad at times, it was a comfort. A constant warmth to my flat in those cold months, a guide through my days, a reassuring presence, though at times it just became too loud for my thoughts. I didn't want the battle. I wanted the clock to make it easy. Yet, right now, strangely, I miss it. I cannot fathom what I am saying really. I miss the sound of my days. The sound of them marching and departing my present in favour of my past. For each time it ticked that moment slipped from my view, over my shoulder. Gone. Time. The more of it that passes the closer each of us is to our own deaths and the death of those we love. Somehow, it feels like more of a friend though. It has brought me this far, so I can trust it to take me where I am destined to go. That clock, deceased, waiting in the wings for a new incarnation.
That's true: time can run, speed up, or just the opposite, drag slowly. But a clock, with its ticking noises, is always strict and punctual. Time perception can be subjective, but 'clock perception' never.
ReplyDeleteWe threw away clocks, like old gadgets, as we threw away our old knowledge of time. Time became confusing, such as the hour when the clock would stop became an outcast from our mind.