I have a number of
clocks scattered throughout the house. Some are powered by
batteries, the hands moving silently over the clock face. Others are
part of kitchen appliances or bedside alarm clocks with bright
red digital numbers, making it important to know how to count at
least from 1 to 59 . And with the digitals, you can always tell when the power
has been out... the red flashing numerals requiring that you hit the
reset button.
Several of the antique clocks have some age to them, clocks in hand-crafted wooden cases that sit on a piece of furniture or mantel, hang on a wall, or like
the grandfather's clock, sit in a prominent place just inside the
front door, greeting people who enter. Because of their age, the
faces are somewhat worn or discolored, reflecting years of service
and of course, the passing of time. To keep these clocks running they
must be carefully wound with a key, once a week, once a month or
somewhere in between,
While each clock's tick has its own unique sound, the purpose for each is the same,
measuring the passing of time, from seconds to minutes to hours.
Several weeks ago I
purchased an antique clock at a local auction. I recognized the name
of the clock maker and although I did not know if it would run, the
price was right. It was worth taking a chance and if it didn't work,
I could always resell it. There was no key for winding and no one knew
whether the clock would keep time or not, but for only a few
dollars, what did I really have to lose.
The face was a bit
dirty and the case very dusty, but the first thing to do was to determine
if it worked. I had a couple of spare keys and, although not a
perfect match, they allowed me to see if it was still able to be
wound. But like many old clocks, this one seemed to be “wound too
tightly,” a common aliment of many antique clocks... a symptom
often similar to some people for that matter too!
I couldn't wind it any
more than it had already been wound so I hung it on the wall, gave
the pendulum a push and waited to see what would happen.
Two weeks later, the
clock was still running, a steady ticking, with no assistance from me
and keeping fairly accurate time. When new, it may have been what
was called a '30 day clock'. But the next day, it stopped. The
little hand was on the 9, the larger one at 4. Now I am not one to be
too superstitious or to read too much into anything, but I wondered if there was any significance to that particular time. During it's
lifetime had someone died or something tragic happened at 9:20 to one of the clock's owners? Or
did the clock's main spring just run out of energy.?
I took the spare key
and carefully began to rewind the clock, making sure not to over do
it. I was still trying to learn its limits, and after several turns
of the key and the push of the pendulum it started up again, the
tick-tock quickly returning to its rhythmic beat.
According to several
searches on the Internet, and who doesn't love the Internet, 'a
clock' as we have come to know it today may have been one of the
earliest mechanical inventions of its time. Traditionally, time had
been determined by the location of the sun in the sky when it wasn't
raining or overcast or by the changing of the seasons.
Nighttime was more
difficult for telling time. Some people were often helped by learning the placement
of the stars in the sky.
But as society changed,
there was a need for greater accuracy of determining time, especially
so people would not be late to their doctor and dental appointments,
With this, the evolution of the clock began, dating back as early as
700 AD. I can only imagine how large and cumbersome those wrist
watches must have been!
There is something very
interesting about time, however. Whether male of female, young or
old, black or white, Christian or Muslim, or no matter where one
lives, time gives us all one thing in common...sixty seconds in a
minute, sixty minutes in an hour and twenty four hours in a day. We
are all the same. No one has more or less time and yet, to look
around the world, there are those who think they are better than
others, are more powerful than others or have greater control over
others by attempting to manager their time.
The key to
understanding the importance of time is not how much of it you have
or think you have, but what you do with the time you have. Remember,
we all have the same amount. What makes us different is what we do
with it.
As I move from room to
room, I can hear the ticking of the clocks, a constant reminder of
how time moves forward. In the quiet and peace that comes with
turning off the lights and television at night just before going to
bed, the ticking of the clocks is a gentle and soothing reminder that
we may not be all that different after all.
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