A Matter of Time

So my grandfather's very old clock is on the wall of our kitchen.

Yesterday I came in, dreading the PTA meeting I had to go to, knowing it was about 3 o'clock and that the meeting was at 6. But I sneaked a look at the clock hoping it wasn't too late (hoping I still had fool around time before I had to be a serious adult)and the clock said 5. What? No, I knew it wasn't 5, the kids had just gotten home from school. I looked a little closer at the clock. It didn't say 5, the hands were in that position, but switched around and it was actually reading 12:30. Well that was wrong too. I looked even closer at the clock. The speedy little red second hand that ticks the seconds off as is does its rounds, the only one you can see actually moving when you look at a clock - it's moving. Backwards.

I stared at the clock. The clock is running backwards. Keeping perfect time, backwards. For a second I am petrified. I slowly look at the microwave clock, for one terrifying second, wondering if this is the moment when all life as we know it has stopped, and is suddenly going in reverse. We are hurtling towards the sun. There's been a magnetic shift. Aliens are controlling our clocks. LIFE AS WE KNOW IT IS OVER.

The microwave clock cheerfully flashes 3 o'clock. The "right" time. Time as we know it.

I yell, "Hey Nathan!!"
"What?"
"You HAVE to come here."
"What is it?"
He's back with Harvey on their phones playing games. That's a long walk, especially if he thinks I'm going to make him take out the trash.
"You HAVE to come here!" I say, all hushed and mystical, not like in my mean mom chore voice.

He and Harvey come thudding out, tall teenage giraffes.

"Look at the clock." They look at it. "No, LOOK at it."
They do. "What the heck...?"
"It's going backwards."
Barry comes out of his office.

"What happened to it?"
"We're GOING BACK IN TIME," I say.
Barry yells, "WE'RE ALL GETTING YOUNGER!!!"

Harvey says, "Oh my God. What if the earth starts going the wrong way."
Nathan says "What if the earth STOPS."

"I think it's a really old clock. My grandfather had it."
"But what clocks reverse themselves? They usually just stop. Slow down and stop."

Emma and Lilly come to check out the clock. We all take videotape of it. Our hands holding up little rectangles of phones, videoing the weird round silver clock, merrily spinning its time that helps no one and is no use.

I can't unplug the clock, or change the time. I was almost late for school this morning because there was plenty of time on that clock. I don't want to stop time from reversing itself. If it can happen to one clock, it's only a matter of time (ha) before other haunted and unusual things begin to happen in my kitchen. Which would be great, because my food sucks.

Also, I don't want to get another clock. I like a clock from my grandfather, he was a mean son of a bitch. That clock saw my mom grow up, in her kitchen. It survived that family. I like that it made it to my kitchen and my family, and instead of quitting on us, it decided to just go all Mad Hatter on us.

Crazy clock can only mean tea parties on the ceiling are just around the corner. I'm letting my crazy clock run. It's the first thing that's made sense in years.