The Correct Time

What time is it?

For eons it was impossible to know what time it was. Rather than being tied to a clock, they were tied to crowing roosters and cows bellowing for someone to relieve them of milk.

The ancient Egyptians used solar clocks to determine the hour, but it would be a long time before those hours were divided into minutes and seconds. Knowing the hour was close enough.

In the 1800’s some men carried a pocket watch that was wound by a key. We have one of those in the Douglas County Museum of History and Art.

Mobile phones grab the correct time from somewhere and display it. Fewer people wear or carry a watch.

The watch I wear provides more information than I need. It was on sale at the big box wholesale store, and I just could not resist it at the price. It has worked faultlessly.

A tiny receiver sets the watch some time after midnight on a signal from Boulder, CO.

I could buy a digital watch for a dollar, but this watch does so many things. It includes a stop watch as well as a countdown timer and a compass. I don’t trust the thermometer and don’t know how to use the altimeter function.

My great-grandfather didn’t own a clock or even a “dollar watch.” Noon was when the sun was straight up. Otherwise it was before or after noon.

Phones and GPS receivers contain maps and display your location from the satellite which has very sensitive clocks on board.

My father loved striking clocks and owned several. In this house we have different ideas on the desirability of striking clocks. After a while you don’t really hear them all going off at once.

Alabama friends live a few feet into the state line, which is also the line between Central and Eastern time zones. They go through life living in both zones. I don’t know how they are on time for anything.

Trips to Newfoundland include setting my watch 90 minutes behind Eastern time.

Four of the world’s thirty-eight time zones are in the lower 48 states, but what about the other two states?

Most of Alaska is in the same zone as the west coast, but what about the Aleutian Islands that swing out into the Pacific towards Russia?

They are in the zone with Hawaii and most of the time they are six hours behind local time here.

My mother had a small rose garden behind their house. She was very proud of the garden and the walkway made of old brick. In the middle was a sun dial. She loved that sun dial and constantly compared it to her kitchen clock.

It was never close.

joenphillips@yahoo.com