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Time Has Stopped (My Mom’s Alzheimer’s)
My mother has three beautiful watches. One fits snugly on her wrist like a golden bracelet, its tiny face fitting seamlessly between the links. The second is a two-toned gold and silver band with a delicate circle for the face. The third is a bold, molded bracelet with turquoise stones. They are each designed with an analog face, complete with hour, minute and second hands.
Mom wears two or all three watches on the same wrist daily. But despite an abundance of time on her hands she is unaware of time itself. The time pieces are a façade of elegance, a broken memory of ritual and purpose. All three watches have stopped. It has been years since they worked. One is missing the clear glass covering.
All are relics, uncovered from a pile of keepsakes kept in storage. But my mother wears them all proudly on her lofty wrist, a display of affluence that defines her status. I often think ruefully that twice each day she and her watches are at the correct time. Every now and then she will ask me for the time and will wind one of the watches until the hour and minute hands match the present. She then remains in that moment, seemingly unaware that time, by definition, marches on.
But is it really so? Could it be that time is a figment of minds hounded by expectations, while my mother is perfectly placed in the stillness of the Eternal Now?
Dixie Ann Black (DAB)
