It’s been a productive day for blog posting: two here at Honey & Quinine and one at Umbrage Universal. I’m a writer. This is what I do. There aren’t enough “Sorry but”s and sulking apathetes in the world to convince me I’m not, and as always from this desk, money is only gravy; it was never the meat.
Earlier this afternoon I was rearranging mine office, moving the boomin’box elsewhere, when I discovered something I hadn’t seen in more than a month: my Acqua wrist watch, water resistant at 30 meters.
I’ve been without a personal time piece since I started working out east. Since losing it, I just figured it was a “fading old coot” thing that happens to folks like me who are fast approaching commencement of their third score of sentient humanly being. Sometimes I misplace my glasses, occasionally my wallet, and frequently the witticism on the tip of my tongue that I didn’t express because I forgot it and remembered it two hours after I could have used it.
If I had really needed a watch, I could have gone to any Walgreen’s and picked up a Timex for a pittance. One day soon after losing it, I actually looked for a watch in the drug store area of a local grocer. And thus, I saved myself $25 because they had no watches. I bought some bananas instead. Yes, they had some bananas.
At el workplace-o there is a clock on the showroom wall behind my desk. If I’m working outside, one of the nearby shop office crew will summon me to the showroom before the office mangler disappears at noon. And if I’m with a crew installing something in “Richburb Place” I know I’ll always return to the shop and home in time for dinner. Most of the guys at work don’t wear watches either. It may be an income bracket kind of thing.
Shall I wear my watch to work now that I’m reunited and it feels so good? Likely no. I’d just get anxious glancing at it in morning rush hour traffic, and all I need to know about time in transit, Jim Leach (WMAY 950) can tell me in the morning and Steve Cochran (WGN 720) can tell me after the whistle blows.
Here at home I have all the clocks I need, but they’re not essential equipment. Without them, I’ll always know when to eat: when I’m hungry and go to bed: when I’m very tired.
My bedside clock-radio alarm is set two and a half hours fast. During school days, it was set an hour fast. After a brief power outage early June I mis-set it because I was guessing. The TV wasn’t on, and besides even if it was, on a Sunday night (as it indeedly was), if Nature isn’t on WSEC, I don’t know what time it is within an hour at least, because that’s all I watch on Sunday night and sometimes, not even that. Since re-setting it 2.5 hours ahead and getting used to it, I’ve been afraid to set it back to actual time. If I do, in my morning state of mind, even with my watch joined at the wrist, odds are I’d arrive at work two and a half hours late!
As #43 might say, I believes “Chicaga” said it best: “Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody really care?” Espikkin’ for my own self, I don’t have to know what time it is, and that’s okay. When I earnestly need to know what time it is, I’ll boot the computer and look or I’ll glance at the clocks the kitchen or living room and hope the batteries are still good. Or I’ll open my eyes, look at my clock radio . . . . and subtract two and a half hours.
Live long . . . . . and proper.
