A favourite pastime for the working classes!
As another case of synchronicity, there was an exchange of comments on the blog Still the Lucky Few earlier today as follows:
The start to the discussion was the writer’s comment on her post “I’ve been waiting for a few minutes, and take out my iphone to check the time. I’ve already done this twice.”
I commented – “I think that it was easier to watch one’s wrist watch every few seconds while waiting than the cumbersome mobile telephones all of us seem to use now instead of the good old ww. There is a story waiting to be told there and I think that I will do just that over in my blog.”
The writer responded – “Well, girls will be girls, Rummuser. Thanks for reading!”
Though I had a different post in mind when I commented, the way events unfolded today leads me to post today’s experience, saving the wrist watch / iPhone debate for another day.
I watch the clock when in a time bound situation like this morning, my friend Neena was to arrive by a flight from Delhi at 10.50 am and to ring me up as soon as she cleared luggage to enable me to fetch her without parking the car inside the airport. From 1050 am I started watching the clock to await her call which never came. I simply decided to take the chance and requested Manjiree to go to the airport anyway and while she was enroute there I got the long awaited phone call from Neena saying that she could not get through to me on the phone and so was taking a cab. I rang up Manjiree and aborted the trip to the airport. In the meanwhile, yes, you guessed it right, I watched the clock till Neena reached home safe.
Neena’s daughter Anisha was to land at Mumbai Sahar Airport at 3.50 pm and I had arranged for a cab to go from Pune to fetch her. The cab driver was given detailed instructions and all went well and as I write this, Anisha is well on her way and will reach home in another half an hour or so. But, I watched the clock from 3.50 pm till 5.30 pm when I got the call from the cab driver that the passenger had been picked up and I spoke to Anisha on her phone. I am watching the clock till Anisha reaches home safe.
And I watched my wrist watch though what I did was really Clock Watching.
The underlying theme in all of this clock-watching (iphone, wrist watch, or good old clock on the wall) is anxiety—it’s that slippage between the outcome that we hope for, and the outcome that we fear and dread. Thank God, we say, when the loved ones that we wait for arrive safely, and we don’t watch the clock with such intensity until the next time someone we love keeps us waiting!
Still the Lucky Few recently posted..Senior Friends—a Meet-up with Marlene
Yes, anxiety is the villain of the piece indeed.
My question is why was she not able to reach on the phone initially?
The Pune airport is still part of the IAF station and often connectivity from there gets affected due to their security operations.
My question is why was she not able to reach on the phone initially? May be her phone was not working..
Raj Krishnaswamy recently posted..Devi Appears in Maha Chandi Homam Jan 2016
Her phone started working once she was on her way and out of the airport.
I tend to watch my device (android) when waiting and have flight arrivers text me. BUT having said that, Daughter and I were fluttering around in a coffee shop, laughing, etc. and completely missed my granddaughter’s text on my phone saying she was hanging about the airport waiting as her flight was 30 minutes early. I felt so, so bad. But we all made a joke of it. 😀
XO
WWW
wisewebwoman recently posted..Bless Da Webz and All Who Sail on her.
As much as we want to not be tied down to any kind of timepieces, we willy nilly end up getting so due to our tendency to get anxious.
I wear a watch with a large face so I can check if we are getting enough done in a rehearsal without stopping to check a device. And I also wear a step counter that also has a clock, high on my arm so no one sees it, since I find it so ugly. The rest of the time I run on LST- Lin standard time. Which also includes the fact that I manage to wake at almost exactly five minutes before my husband’s alarm clock every morning, since I absolutely hate starting a day being jarred awake. (for trains and appointments, I use OPST- other people’s standard time, ie my watch is there in an emergency, but there are usually enough large clock towers here, or church bells, or other people have a phone or computer on.)
Dun-Na-Sead recently posted..And Gutenberg Lived Here: A-440 And Me
My internal alarm clock is very much like yours and I don’t have to use the alarm to wake up as a routine. I do however use alarms for exceptional situations like having to get up earlier than my usual time during my siesta to keep an appointment or somethings like that.
I’m a useless wrist watch wearer – I could never keep them from breaking – not in really snapping the strap/other – just they would fail to work – in the end I gave them away and have never got a replacement…
I now of course have an ordinary old cellphone but even that I had to change the setting so it was like a clock as I couldn’t read the little numbers like 16.04…
and I have a clock on my stove at home, which only gets altered come day light savings or when there is a power outage…
You can afford to be different! You have an enviable lifestyle.
I don’t wear a watch, but the problem with trying to watch clocks these days is that so many places don’t have clocks anymore. Have you been able to find any clocks in a mall? What about a grocery store? It’s one of the main reasons I make sure I keep my smartphone with me; a few weeks ago I needed to have it repaired and they told me to come back in 30 minutes. I had no way of knowing when 30 minutes were up; sigh…
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Yes, what you say is also true. Our railway stations have them but sadly, even airports seem to hide them away from plain sight.