“The question is not whether we have time. The question is how we make the most use of it.”
On several occasions, strangers have stopped me in the street and asked me, “Do you have the time?” What those people wanted to know was what my watch was showing on its’ face in that moment. I received my first watch from my father on my Bar Mitzvah, when I turned 13. A Bar or Bat Mitzvah is a Jewish tradition that recognizes a boy or a girl for coming of age and becoming responsible for his or her actions.
Things have changed dramatically in the last 55 years. One of the changes is that no one asks me for the time anymore, since most people can check the time on their smart phones. A few years ago, I stopped wearing a wristwatch or what it became to be known as a “timepiece”. But the wristwatch is still a coveted item. Online I discovered that there are at least 8 timepieces that were sold for over $1 Million. Mind you, they just serve one purpose—to accurately show time.
Then there is the new “hot” item on the market, the Apple Watch, whose price can go from $349 to $17,000. It can have multiple functions, but can we live without it?
Watches evolved in the 17th century from spring-powered clocks, which appeared as early as the 14th century. So perhaps before that, humans did not have a concept of time the way that we have today, divided into hours, minutes, and seconds. The Torah declares that there are seven days of creation. We began to measure the month cycle by observing the moon. It required two witnesses to announce the appearance of the new moon to begin a new month.
But when did we originally begin to measure time? When I googled “who created the concept of time”, I found many articles, but not an answer. I found one article in the Scientific American, which posed the question, “What if time was an illusion?”
Father Time’s teachings were the true measurement of time. We all have time, but do we use it wisely?
In his first book “Tuesdays with Morrie”, Mitch Albom visits his teacher, Morrie Schwartz, who is dying. When Morrie was asked what he would do if granted one day of good health, he answered that he would go dancing with his wife.
P.S.
I am reading “The Time Keeper” and writing this story on vacation while watching the ocean in a resort on the Northeast coast of Oregon. When I thought about the images to show the change of time to accompany this story, the answer came immediately—five times that light changed over the ocean. Please read the book, enjoy, and share it with a friend.
Do Not Keep Me As A Secret!
Smile And Please SHARE It With A Friend!
