One of the
central attractions in the city of Prague is the clock tower in the main
square. There is a certain irony that vacationers, supposedly freed from clock
watching, are drawn to this tower clock.
They arrive five minutes before each
hour to stare upward at the moving hands and the parade of carved wooden
puppets that mark each changing hour. Tours guides offer stern warnings that
the area near the tower is notorious for petty crime. While tourists are
transfixed by the clock and its puppets, pickpockets help themselves to money,
passports and yes, watches.
The tradition
of village clock towers evolved from the practice of having a man stand guard
to keep watch and periodically ring a bell to mark the hour. The name of that
profession is the origin of the watch we now wear on our wrist.
Timepieces
gradually moved from the public clocks of the middle ages, to clocks inside the
home, to pocket watches, to ones now strapped on our arm, getting closer to us
all the time. While convenience has advantages, we no longer enjoy the communal
reminder of passing time.
Time is an
important topic for Father’s Day. This week’s newspaper ads show this deep
connection.
From Timex to Rolex, wristwatches are the number one gift for Dad.
It may be the perfect gift too. Fatherhood is a short season and it flies by.
My father
died when he was 56 and I was 18. His death was sudden and unexpected. It
wasn’t until I crossed the 50 threshold that I understood that my father had
died young. I knew, of course, that I was young when he died, but now I understand
that he was young too.
Time was an
important part of my father’s life. He was an industrial engineer, a “time and
motion study man”. His work was about efficiency and calculation. He carried a clipboard and wore an elegant
gold Hamilton watch.
Whether due
to nature or nurture, I too have an overly developed sense of time. I
multi-task, write daily to-do lists, and I lust after organizing systems. But I
also resist being tethered to time. Maybe it’s because I watched my father save
so much time, which he never got a chance to use, that I have a love/hate
relationship with “time management”.
My own
calendar shocks people. It’s an oversized month-at-a-glance book in which I
track tasks by scribbling through the borders and across the lines intended to
demarcate the days. Each month’s page becomes an abstract work of scribbles and
swirls and then it’s torn away. I don’t look back.
Death isn’t
the only way that dads go missing from their kid’s lives. Divorce or drinking
can do it too, but most often it’s work. That’s not new. Fathers of the 1950’s
didn’t come to school plays or Girl Scout ceremonies; Mom went to those things
and told Dad about it at dinner.
Are today’s
Dads wiser? It seems so. Last year fathers reported spending four hours a day
with their kids, compared with just 2.7 hours in 1965. But I wonder, are those
hours together real leisure and pleasure or are we multi-tasking the homework
and the errands with the quality time?
It’s a cliché to say how fast childhood
goes and how fast fatherhood disappears too, but it’s true.
With our
lists and calendars-- and even our watches—we can pick our own pockets. In
trying to better organize them our lives can be stolen away.
Next week
summer begins. Will the livin’ be easy? Or will we tick it off and time it out?
Fathers, keep watch. Just look at the time.
***
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