Becoming 24

Every clock has at least four hands, and when I tell time, all of them move except the ones attached to my Dad’s arms.

I can see him standing in the kitchen. His left-hand resting at his side and his right pointing at the clock hanging above the sink. He’s standing still, unmovable, like the Queen’s guard. I like to say he’s pointing at 11:30.

Maybe he stopped his experiment because he realized his lesson was getting through, my brothers and I stopped watching the clock and started watching how we spend our time. Maybe I grew tired of the experiment he made of telling time — which he always felt the need to do in front of the refrigerator — but now I understand.

“A minute is a long time” he’d say. “Do you know how much you can get done in 60 seconds?”

Then, like clockwork, we would stand in the middle of the kitchen in silence and watch as 60 seconds went by.

It took forever.

I can hear that clock ticking on Saturday mornings. It whispers to my psyche if I happen to fall asleep on the couch in my living room. It says get to work when I should be getting rest.

I don’t think I’ve looked above the sink since my grade school days but I did this morning. The clock doesn’t glow in the dark, but it shed some light on an idea I’ve been grappling with, the process of becoming your future self.

I’m wrapping my head around the so-called Kobe Year. Who will I be after my 24th birthday? No. 8 or No. 24?

There is a reluctant excitement in watching an icon receive his punishment. Having both jerseys retired says you were always perfect, that No. 8 is just as great as No. 24, but my Dad taught me that life is like transition lenses.

I know Kobe developed like photos in a dark room. So this year I’ll do the same.

We all evolve in the same way that the sun rises in the morning.

Gradually. Diligently. Then, all at once, we become the person on the other side of the clock. At the changing of the guard.