Does anybody really know what time it is?
Does anybody really care?
Wistful waxings of the great poets aside, I don’t think the question Chicago raises has ever been more eloquently expressed.
Or more timely.
Har har.
After all, today is February 29.
Leap day.
Or Leap Year Day.
Or Day of the Leap.
Or whatever the hell it’s called.
It’s that extra day that shows up every four years bringing with it equal chances of life altering success and spirit crushing defeat.
You know, kind of like an Election Day that you don’t have to stand in line to experience.
And on this “extra” day, I have come to realize something.
I actually don’t really care what time it is.
Because I don’t think that time really means anything.
To put the important finer point on it, though, what I mean is that I don’t think the measurement of time means anything and, in some ways, we would all be happier little clams on the beach if we didn’t have to be bothered with it.
I don’t for a second presume to come off as some bush league Stephen Hawking.
But my experience has been that, for every “pro” thing that can be said about the way the awareness of time affects our lives, there is an equal, if not more powerful, “con” to make it a wash.
And “time” has an extraordinary capacity for being cruel.
How often have you felt the frustration that comes from waiting for the red light to turn green, while the digital readout on your dashboard tells you that you have less than one minute to get to the store for that last minute “must have” holiday gift you didn’t know you needed till “the last minute?”
How many high hopes have been dashed as you watched that big ass timepiece in the stadium tick off those final three seconds and send your favorite “Cinderella” team back to the locker room just inches short of the first down needed to keep the dream alive?
How much stomach lining has been sacrificed while you sat, watching the clock, waiting for the phone to ring with the good news about that job you just interviewed for, only to see the five o’clock hour come…and go without so much as a ringtone to ease your anxiety?
How often have you felt the pain of looking up at the clock to see that it’s only been three minutes since you last remembered that he or she doesn’t love you anymore and isn’t coming back?
Time stands still. Time runs out. Time marches on. Time waits for no one.
Oh, wait. Time heals all wounds.
Actually, we both know that “heal’ is too strong a word.
Because the scars remain.
As time goes by.
And the whole idea of measuring time is largely a waste of time, anyway.
Take, for example, Daylight Savings Time.
Spring forward, fall back.
Well, except in Arizona and a number of other places.
Or time zones.
The ten o’clock news in Rhode Island comes on at nine o’clock in Nashville.
And 60 Minutes follows next on most CBS stations.
With the exception of the West Coast, where it will be seen at its regular time.
I didn’t realize until just this morning as I realized that it’s the Day of the Leap again, that I actually envy pre-historic man.
No clocks. No wrist watches. No digital read outs.
It was either light.
Or it was dark.
And you simply took care of business accordingly.
Living life, not “in the moment” or “one day at a time” or “minute by minute”
Just living it.
I bet Grok the caveman didn’t ever stress out because they weren’t “on time”.
Or spend time in the doghouse because he forgot it was his and Mrs. Grok’s “anniversary”.
Chances are, if they really loved each other, every day was an anniversary.
Chicago really said it all in that song didn’t they?
Only John Lennon might have said it better, had he added a verse.
“Imagine there’s no second hand / It’s easy if you try”
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