Tick…tock…tick…tock ……And I’m late again. 

Time. It’s a measurement we use to stay on track. I’m sure we’ve all had a time where we were late to something. Whether it’s to school, to work, or something else, being late is a struggle. But could you imagine if all of a sudden, you weren’t able to check the time anymore?

Well for starters, you can throw out the idea of being “on time” to anything ever again. It would likely be the opposite. You would miss a lot of things, more than you’d even realize. At first, it sounds like an amazing time. Not having to think about plans, doing things at your own pace.. 

But as much as it may feel good to be carefree and spontaneous, the negatives outweigh the positives. You wouldn’t feel relaxed for very long and your responsibilities would eventually creep on you. How would you know what time to eat, or sleep? To go to school, work, or other activities? It’s not ideally freeing, more along the lines of stressful.

Without time, your brain would end up distorting how long time really feels. Have you ever heard the saying “Time flies when you’re having fun”? It’s a similar concept. Time can feel like trying to walk through quicksand, or it can feel like skipping through a wide open grass field. Whether time seems to pass quickly or slowly, it always feels like we never have enough of it.

In my childhood home, there was a clock on the wall that would go “click-clock” every passing second. Some people might find that annoying but that sound of the repetitive click-clock was satisfying to me, not ever missing a single beat. I enjoyed watching the hands of the clock turn, fascinated how seconds turned into minutes turned into hours. How could such a simple invention carry so much importance in the way we go about our day? If clocks didn’t exist that clicking sound wouldn’t exist, and without a measurement of time I would be lost. 

Lost in time.. Lost in life. 

I would feel constantly behind. Like a weight submerged underwater, it’d be suffocating. I could feel myself slowly slipping into a state of unease, feeling antsy all the time. What if I miss something? Am I forgetting something? Will I forget something? I wouldn’t know. The thought of forgetting important things is unnerving to me, and to me living without a source of telling time would be just as distressing. 

As long as clocks keep ticking, I’ll be at ease. Having a source of keeping time has made me come to realize how significant each moment in my life truly is. Even through all the ups and downs, every experience in my life is unique to me. No one else would experience it quite the same. That is special, and something I’ll never take for granted. With clocks, I guess I don’t feel so lost anymore.