I taught science for over thirty years.  I have learned to separate fact from belief, real from unreal and rational thinking from irrational concepts.

There is a world of superstition out there.  It is a danger to society to rely on unproven ideas.  This is why many people burned many women (and men) as witches for many centuries.  I once dated someone who would lick her finger and make a smudgy X on my windshield every time a black cat would cross the road in front of us.  She said it was for good luck.  It was lucky for me that I had a tissue to clean the many X’s from my window, following an afternoon drive.

Really?

Many people won’t walk under a ladder, or will throw salt over their shoulder if they broke a mirror.  Too many people think that something really weird is going to happen on any Friday the 13th.  Great movie, but let’s get real!  It’s just a date on a calendar.

However, some superstitions are interesting and not totally without merit.  I’d whistle every time I passed a cemetery but the problem is, I can’t whistle like I used to do when I was a kid.  So I don’t and nothing has happened to me in the meantime.  It’s not totally surprising since it is common to fear graveyards.  In fact, I rather like them.  I find them interesting places to discover local history and contemplate life.

I believe I made my point.  Superstitions are a little nutty.

Except…

I am ready to admit to my readers that I suffer from the burden of superstition on a daily basis.  It’s just one misplaced belief.  Only one, but it can ruin my whole day.

I put myself in your hands by telling you this.  If any of my former students finds out about this, I could lose my standing in their memory.

You see, I cannot bring myself to mark off a day on the calendar until it’s precisely midnight.

It sounds goofy to you, but I just can’t bring my Sharpie to the wall calendar and proudly make an X until the clock strikes 12:01 am.  But that puts me into an altogether new dilemma.  Which clock should I trust?

I am well aware that Einstein told us that time is relative.  Time, some mystics may say, is an illusion.  What time it is, is a human construct.  If I lived in a deep cave somewhere in France, time would really have no meaning to me.  There would be no diurnal cycle to tell me when the sun rises and sets.  But, I don’t live in a cave in France.  I live at Rainbow Lake, NY…and that makes me need to know what time it is.

Do I trust my wall clock in the kitchen?  Of course not.  I have to change it twice a year and I can never be sure exactly where to set the minute hand.  The clock on the oven is a possibility, but we have occasional power failures and we have to reset the timer.  So, that leaves the cable box.

Now, I do not know where Time Warner (or Verizon) gets their time feed, but is it exact?  I have no way of knowing.

I had another idea.  Check my iPad time or maybe my iPhone time or even my laptop time, but isn’t that all feed by Verizon?  I didn’t know where to turn.  Then a really odd thought came to me.  Maybe, just maybe, all this time was being fed to me from Amazon?  And, all this time, I didn’t know.  They sell everything, don’t they?

So, I just have to learn to depend on one clock and take it on faith that it is correct…to the second…before I can approach my wall calendar to make my X.

Sometimes, I wear a wrist watch and a belt watch that hangs from a loop on my jeans.  My son, Brian, thinks that is a crazy thing to do.  I think he is thinking of an ancient Zen saying: A man who wears two watches never knows what time it is.  I see it differently.  A man who wears two watches has choices.

But, one choice I don’t have is when the Sharpie traces an X on the calendar.  I have to wait until the time is right.  But now I have a clear graphic that reminds me of how fast time is flying.

That’s another story…for a different time and another day.