Time

The old Westclox Big Ben on grandmother's mantle; tick, tick, tick, dink, tick, tick …

The clock's alarm stopped working years ago; it didn't hesitate to try but could manage only a tinny dink every thirty minutes; tick, tick, dink! Three-thousand six-hundred ticks and two dinks each hour, hour upon hour.

Laying on the sofa, I was too mesmerized by time's magical spell to run out of the house and seek peace of a summer boyhood. Quiet afternoon quickly slid into nerve-shattering evening when I sensed grandmother slapping me across the face; one … two … three times and I felt the sting of her bony fingers against my clammy cheek before I awakened from the torturous rhythm of time gone berserk. Shakily, I stood and tottered outside on wobbly knees, the ticking and dinking still haunting my brain. I climbed into the smokehouse, retrieved my trusty gravel flipper and a handful of chipped marbles from concealment beneath the floorboards and eased my way back into the living room. My plan was simple, I would punish grandmother for slapping me so hard and then Big Ben's time would come; it would tick, tick, dink no more … for eternity. Bwahahaha!