telling time

Some days, I tell time like normal people. I look at a clock, my phone, my computer. I know if it's morning or night, because people sleep at night and are awake during the day. Knowing the time isn't a problem.

Other days and nights, I get lost. Four isn't a reasonable number for time - four am? four pm? Four and twenty blackbirds? Sometimes, I tell time by the clocktower, those days. It only chimes during the day, so I know if I hear four chimes, when I'm lying in bed in the dim light, that it is four in the afternoon. I have lost my day. Night is approaching.

And sometimes I'll hear it chime eight, and know there's still hope of getting up at a reasonable hour. A reasonable hope of telling time in the way other people know.