Letting Go of a Classic

Do you have something around your house that you can't seem to get rid of?  Even though it's old, clunky, and considered ugly, by some members of your family?

I do.  It's called my digital clock radio.  In case you haven't seen one in a while, they look like this:  

isn't she a beauty? 

And this big, brown, clunky, beauty proudly sits on my night stand, like she has since we moved in together so many years ago.  

I got this clock so long ago, it feels like another lifetime.  I think it was sometime during my Middle School years, but due to the "Senior Moments" I've been experiencing of late, I can't be sure.  I do, however, remember being very excited when I got it.  Because by owning it, I became A Big Girl. A girl no longer dependent on her father, for her morning wake up call.  A girl who could, instead, hit her snooze button every nine minutes for as long as it took to drag herself out of bed and into the kitchen where said Dad would have a hot, delicious breakfast waiting.  (So, apparently, not that big after all)

Additionally, I remember going to K-Mart, (remember this was the Pre-Target Age) to pick her out.  Wondering, when I got there, how I would ever choose the right one for me.  For staring back at me, from the shelves, with blinking eyes of red and green, and cloaks of brown veneer, was an array of the most advanced timekeepers I had ever seen.  

It didn't help that I could feel my dad's brown eyes boring into the back of my head.  Silently urging me to hurry up and just pick one.  He just couldn't appreciate my dilemma.  He didn't understand how by purchasing The Right One, I would transition from baby girl, to full-fledged adult.  Or, at the very least, a much cooler preteen.

Finally, though, I found her.  Or maybe my dad,  tired of waiting, made the choice for me.  Regardless, I was happy as hell and couldn't wait to get her home and plugged in so I could tune the dial to KJR and start listening to the smooth sounds of the 70s.  (Yes, I was as cool then, as I am now) And as we drove out of the K-Mart parking lot, headed for home, I actually felt myself becoming cooler, more mature, more modern.  Techie, even, before techie was even heard of.

After removing her from the box, and blowing the dust off her glorious faux-wood exterior, I sat on my bed and examined every inch of her; every dial, every button, every switch.  Already practicing with the cool "sleep" button, that promised to lull me to sleep later that night, and wondering how I'd wake up the next morning.  Would it be to the buzz of an alarm, or the sound of music?

Just a few hours later, though, I realized that cool "sleep" button  wouldn't be getting much use after all.  For it didn't lull me to sleep, as promised.  It just kept me awake, my mind on overdrive.   And the next morning, my choice of alarm also became abundantly clear.  Softly played music won out over the buzzing alarm, which rather than wake me gently, sent me into a full-fledged panic.  This was not, I felt, a good way to start one's day.

I have since learned that my sleep requirements are very little; a bed and a dark room and I'm good.  Ironically, though, I can fall asleep on the couch, with my family talking and the television blaring.  And, years later, I rarely even have to set an alarm.  My internal clock is so finely tuned to Dave's wake up time, that once the clock strikes 5:40,  the animals and I know it's time to start the day.  

I do still listen to my clock's radio, though.  (Just not at night)  And Bob Rivers has brought KJR back into my life.  Every morning I laugh along with him and his crew while going through my morning routine.    Although, admittedly, if I want to hear with any clarity, I have to stand RIGHT IN FRONT of her.  For the minute I step away, the music and the voices are gone, replaced with crackling, incomprehensible static.  (But, it's very hard to apply mascara while standing next to your bed)

And that's not her only fault.  God forbid we lose power!  Because if we do, and I need to reset her, I might as well just say goodbye to my family, because they won't be seeing me for the rest of the day. For the switches that used to allow me to travel back and forth through the hours with ease, now stick.  And when I do, finally, get them to work, and the numbers to move, they move  so slowly I can actually hear the impatient sighs of Father Time.

And, yet, I keep her.  Why? When all of my other preteen and adolescent possessions are long gone.   

I don't know.  

Maybe it's because she is the last of an era.  Maybe I like to think she's of an age that she's become fashionable again. 

I do know I could certainly do without her.  I could definitely put the space she takes up to good use in another way.  Just imagine how many more books I could get on there if she was gone?

I could even join the Twenty-First-Century, and use the alarm on my IPhone. Like Dave does.  Like the rest of the world does. 

But I don't.  

We've been through way too much together:  high school drama, college, first loves, heartbreaks, marriage, nursing babies, infuriating toddlers, a breast cancer scare.  And so I let her stay.   

Mostly, though, because I would miss her.  I would miss her peeling brown "wood," and those green eyes I can see from both near and far--even without my glasses on.  Those eyes that, every day, tell me when it's time to pick up Nora from school.  Those eyes, that have ticked away the minutes,--one. by. one.--while I waited, sleeplessly, for my oldest daughter to make it home before her curfew.  

So, while she's not the beauty she once was, (who is?) she has been one hell of a clock.  And, despite a bit of suffering over the years, a perfect room mate.  She has been spilled upon, knocked over, bumped, scratched, and until recently, and thanks to a much younger Annabelle, adorned with a Scooby-Doo sticker.  And in all these years, she has never failed me.  Unless you count the times when I, incorrectly set her.  But, in her defense, how is she to know that I really want to wake up at 6:00 a.m. and NOT 6:00 p.m.?  She just does what she's told.

And so, until her buttons and switches no longer move at all, I think I'll keep her. After all, she does make a pretty good coaster.  

xoxo
S-


P.S.  
I realized I have one other item that could be added to the list of relics I can't seem to part with:  my big, fuzzy, and oh-so-sexy, pink bathrobe.  Actually, it's not really THAT old.  It's just so pink, so plushy.  So plushy, in fact, that when I wear it, I feel like a walking stick of cotton candy.  And it's so warm that after just one cup of coffee in the morning, I am sweating.  But it was the first real gift Anna ever bought me for Christmas.  With her own money!  So, sap that I am, I'll probably be sweating it out, for years to come. 

Or I could just throw it in the closet and bring it out on those days when the power goes out and I need to keep warm while setting the clock.