Sam was amused his watch had stopped. It had become a running joke in the family because his father Ted had ruined watches consistently for decades. Now that his father was gone Sam found his shared ability to either stop watches or make them run slow forged a vital link with his dad.
It wasn't because they manhandled them or smashed them
against corners of tables by accident.
This unusual talent to mess with watches was weirder than simple carelessness.
His father had been a
young man on holiday in a small coastal village when his ability to interfere
with such devices first occurred. He'd
treated himself to a cheap watch. It
had cost less than a fiver so he had not expected it to last forever. It had stopped by the time he wore it
back to his basic bed and breakfast that evening. Taking it back to the shop, the reluctant shopkeeper replaced
it. Two days later that watch also
stopped and Sam was back in the small shop.
This time the shopkeeper was belligerent.
“What are you doing to my watches?” He asked Ted.
Ted responded,
“If you had enough turnover your watches wouldn't be such
old stock that they've stopped working.”
The shopkeeper, a high pitched red haired Scotchman was
livid and pulling a battery tester from under his counter took the watch
battery out and tested it. The battery
had lost a lot of its charge and Ted had gloated in being proved right. He proceeded to lecture the shopkeeper on
the lifespan of all batteries.
“You do realise, even on the shelves, in packets, batteries
run down?”
The shopkeeper’s face was as red as his hair and he
muttered,
“Do you think I don’t know my own business?”
As he blustered, he took a fresh battery tested it and then
inserted it into the watch. Feeling
righteous and successfully assertive about the whole business Ted left with a
working watch once more.
It lasted three days before stopping again. Ted was back in the shop aware that there
would be unpleasantness ahead but determined nonetheless. However, this time the Scotchman would not
countenance any exchange or another battery.
Despite all Ted’s arguments he would respond with the same line, red
eyebrows high in outrage
“Do you think I got washed in on the tide?”
Ted walked home defeated with this effective one liner. He told himself such isolated tiny shops
were probably filled with obsolete batteries/watches. What on earth had he expected from such a rural location, so
little frequented.
Later that year he’d bought a fancy watch. The type young men go for when they want to
impress! Ted had just met Sam’s mother
and in his excitement to create a favourable image had lashed out on a hundred
pound watch. It looked good and on
their first date Ted had admired the young girl opposite almost as much as his
swanky new expensive timepiece. With
such a girl on one arm and another beauty on his left ticking away Ted had
experienced one of those rare moments of sweet triumph that come too rarely in
life. As it turned out he won the
girl’s heart but the watch died almost as quickly as its cheap predecessor.
Ted was relieved that the five year guarantee on his new
watch meant he was able to get it fixed for free in the sleek fancy city shop
he’d bought it in. However, after
returning to the shop twice with the stopped watch he noted that the suave
young salesman was becoming as suspicious as the red-haired Scotchman. He commented to Ted,
“You do realise, sire, that the watch is not
waterproof. If you get it wet that will
effect the mechanism.”
Ted pointed out that he didn't get it wet unless perhaps a
drop of rain on the way to work. The
salesman seized on this and pointed out that if Ted had wanted to wear the
watch in downpours he should have opted for the waterproof model in the first
place. There followed an insidiously
pointless and fruitless argument about the type of rain Ted walked in. Had it been the soft Irish rain as Ted
claimed, or the tropical downpour the young salesman favoured. The upshot was Ted left with a broken
expensive watch.
Disgruntled by the whole affair Ted threw the wretched watch
in a small dish and forgot about it. By
now his new wife was pregnant, with Sam, and Ted had discovered a new world
beyond material possessions. This tiny
life growing inside his wife was a part of him and a part of her. At times Ted thought his heart would explode
with happiness. Who knew the world
could be filled with all this richness.
It was years before Ted’s ability to stop/ruin timepieces
became clear. Only those he wore were
affected. If he carried the watch in
his pocket, something he proceeded to do until well into his eighties, they
worked fine.
Now, Sam had discovered he had inherited his father’s
strange knack. Instead of just
accepting his lot Sam had gone online to do some amateur research. Where there others like him and his late
father? What caused this unusual
effect? Was there a scientific
explanation? He discovered PEARS
Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research which involved a scientific study of
consciousness-related physical phenomena.
There was an interesting video of how the research began.
http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/implications.html
However, the following information on the project seemed to concentrate on selling dvds, lamps that changed colour with human consciousness, or devices that sent you random text
messages based on your mood. These were marketed at ridiculous prices to the gullible and desperate. Sam, gave up and
accepted his lot. He remembered his
father’s last words in the hospice.
“Do you think I'll get washed out on the tide?”
