Recent ways I’ve watched my friends (and myself) measure time:
durgapolashi:
- Letting a head cold run its course
- Counting how many times one song played on repeat from her walk to the bodega and back again
- Rationing the last pages of a book over the course of a week
- Letting her eyebrows grow out
- Increasing her stamina
- Anticipating leather jacket season
- The time it takes for rice to cook perfect
- Noticing a new wrinkle near her eye when she laughs for real
- Noticing a thread on a skirt hem unravel more and more
- Remembering the last time she wore a skirt
- Seeing the skin sag on her father’s neck when they facetime
- Noting the way he seems more tired
- Watching a gel manicure grow out
- Waiting for his couch to arrive in the mail
- Days left on antibiotics
- Days left until rehearsals start
- Estimating her time of arrival
- Remembering the last time she saw a play, and with whom
- Counting the hours since her last meal
- Watching a scar heal
- Watching a gold ring’s band start to thin
- How long it’s been since she’s had sex
- Bottle blonde hair growing out
- Watching a polaroid develop
- How many days she’s been sober
- How many months she’s been sober
- Hours spent on a layover
- Time it took to finish that can of Altoids
- Noting a year passing in the length of someone’s hair
- Split ends
- The last time she saw the ocean
- Calculating how much time it’ll take to cab vs. subway
- Perceiving afternoon shadows on her living room wall
- How many pirouettes she can achieve in how many seconds
- Time ticking on a YouTube ad before I press “Skip”
- Frustratingly noting how quick this expensive candle melts into nothing
- Seeing how fast it takes to finish leftover birthday cake
- Remembering the last time a birthday felt like a new year
- Finding last year’s Kleenex in a winter coat pocket
- Finding a movie stub from a movie you hated but that you saw with someone you loved, and now too, hate a little
- Finding a postcard in a book
- Timestamp on a text
- Years since you’ve worn yellow
- Waiting for Pisces season to start
- Waiting for mercury to no longer be in retrograde
- Weeks pregnant
- The moon
- Watching the sole of her heeled boot wear out
- Disbelief in recalling something that occurred more than a decade ago
- How many minutes until the Uber arrives
- Days it’s been since you wished you’d exchanged numbers
- Waiting for the pizza to arrive
- For the soup to cool
- For the storm to pass
- For my nerves to settle
- For the fresh smell of paint to hopefully never, completely fade
- How many days since you dropped off your dry-cleaning
- Your favorite waitress is no longer at your favorite place
- How many months it’s been since he’s last seen her
- The way she stands different in the summer
- The way she looks happiest in October
- The way she seemed happier last year
- A plant, once small, now spider-legging across a window sill
- A baby cousin, now big enough to say your name
- A bottle of Advil, suddenly empty
- A deadline, suddenly imminent
- The last page of a notebook
- Remembering a grudge
- Christmas, again
- 30, real soon
- A year since he died
- Wondering how many tasks you can accomplish while on hold
- If when you surface from the subway, the sun will have already set
- How long she can stay out based on what time she has to wake up
- Counting the days it’s been since her last period
- How many books he’s already read in the new year
- The time it takes to drive somewhere in a snowstorm
- Minutes spent in line at CVS while hungover
- Experiencing estrangement from someone
- Running out of olive oil
- The days already feeling longer