The Clock
I'm not sure what the point of this message is, really.
Maybe I'll leave it up to you to decide. I'll just tell
you a story and you take from it what you find of value.
All I know is the idea has been taunting me for a few days
and I knew I had to do something with it.
It's all about a clock. Oh, not just any clock. A clock
that came with a gift of time.
When my wife, Marianne discovered she had breast cancer and
it was decided that a mastectomy was necessary, she decided
it had to be a double mastectomy. Chances were very strong
that a secondary cancer would develop in the remaining breast.
In her mind it was the logical answer...take both of them.
Turns out she was right. The other was pre-cancerous.
This is where the clock comes in.
I was living in fear of losing her.
My answer was to give her a gift of time.
I bought a Hermle Mantle clock and had "To my Baby" engraved
on the back.
No, I never heard of a Hermle clock either. I really wanted
to buy her a grandfather clock because that's what she always
wanted.
I couldn't afford a grandfather clock. In fact, I really couldn't
afford the mantle clock either.
All I wanted to do was give her more time. That's what that clock
symbolized.
Fast forward a few years and one day I discovered the mantle
clock was broken. The wind up spring went "twang" and it could
not be wound.
I returned it to the store and they fixed it. I was charged around
$65.
I was upset because, of all things, I didn't want this gift, this
precious gift of time to fail. I don't remember ever giving her
anything more valuable.
Fast forward again. Less than one year later the exact same thing
happened.
This time I had to pay around $20 to have the same thing fixed.
I won't get into the details of what happened next accept for what
they call in crude terms, a "pissing contest" between myself and the
clerk. If you don't know what that means, it simply means no one
wins the fight. It's a guy thing.
Since its return I have only wound it a few times and not all the way.
Marianne won't do it out of fear it will break again.
The clock? Sadly it sits on the shelf in my living room, unwound
and a constant reminder to me that time goes on with or without
you. You can only give your time to someone and you can never
extend their time at all. Each of us has 24 hours, no more, no
less.
Believe me I spent a great deal of time in prayer about this
clock. Mostly asking God to forgive me for how I handled it all.
I prayed before I went into the store each time and upon leaving
had to pray for forgiveness.
No one understood the significance of this gift.
The last time I wound the clock was a few weeks ago. Last week
I noticed it had stopped. It has remained that way.
Look at the picture of my clock. When it stopped, it stopped at
exactly one o'clock.
It pains me to see it there un-used, empty and void of its original
purpose. The love remains.
In its stillness and silence it has sent me a gift after all...
the time on the face of the clock.
One. The One Who knows me best. The One Who saved my wife's life. The One Who
will forgive me again and again. The One Who gives me the gift of time everyday and until my time has run out.
Bob Perks
bobperks@comcast.net