At the tone the time will be...

Within days of Sam's birth I found myself obsessed with time. I always was wondering what time it was, how long it had been since I had gotten any sleep, when was the last time I had fed Sam, how long he was sleeping, etc. We had clocks in our apartment, but they were all downstairs, and our bedroom, (and bathroom), which I lived exclusively in since a painful epesiodomy made stairs impossible, had just my little alarm clock which did NOT have a light on it making telling time at night impossible. It was becoming all-consuming, this need to know what time it was. Finally after about a week of fretting about it, I dragged Rob to Walmart (in the middle of the night) to buy a clock with glow in the dark numbers. Ahhh, bliss. To be able to know the time the instant Sam woke me up with his crying was wonderful. Sam waking me up with his crying was not wonderful, but that's another story. Not only did I know what time it was, but the clock had a radio so I could listen to intelligent conversation on NPR after Rob left for work and I was home alone with  a newborn.

I no longer have this obsession with time. Or maybe I do, but I don't notice it much anymore because in every subsequent apartment I have made sure that there is a plethora of clocks. In our current home there are very few places where you would have to do more then just turn your head to see what time it is. This makes being at other people's homes difficult for me. Especially when I'm there for longer then just a day. Visiting with my in-laws has been especially tough as they don't seem to have this need to know. Rob's sister Karen's house especially. There were only two clocks in her house, the microwave and oven clock, and they were right next to each other. It used to drive me crazy! His other sister, Susan, has a great big, lovely clock right in the central portion of the house that can be seen from many different angles and many different rooms. But it is always, ALWAYS, either not running or hours off. Rob does not share my compulsion, but he is sympathetic. Whenever we were at Karen's he would randomly tell me what time it was, just so I would know. And he got me a lovely watch for Christmas. Bless the man.

All this leads up to what I wanted to write about. We got Sam an alarm clock for Christmas in an attempt to head the 5:30 wake-ups off at the pass. For the last two months we've been drilling it into him that on school days his clock needs to say 6:30am before he can get out of bed, and we're trying to get him to wait till 7:00 on the weekends, with mixed success. He's been excited to have his own clock and loves that it has a night light and is battery operated so he can carry it around, but really, he didn't get time. The clock just had numbers that changed, usually when he wasn't looking. But about 3 weeks ago, he suddenly got it. Somehow the concept of measuring time clicked in his brain; his clock no longer just said six, three, zero, but actually said six thirty and he KNEW WHAT THAT MEANT! This is, of course, very exciting that my oldest understands this concept. What isn't so exciting is that he now feels the need to tell me what the time is ALL the time. Every few minutes he'll come running to me with the latest updates. He'll be playing in his room and then start yelling out to me, "Mom, its 3:30!", really excited and expecting me to be excited too. He'll run back and forth between the kitchen and my bedroom, watching the microwave clock and my clock to see if they change at the same time. And all this is getting really, really annoying. Rob says its just that understanding time is a new thing for Sam and it will wear off soon. I think it may be punishment for my obsessions when he was born. Somehow or other my preoccupation with time got into the breast milk, I just know it, and I'll be spending the rest of my life trying to get away from knowing what time it is!