kept by · h. milray, winder · — · town & outer parish · 1911–1969
h. milray wound forty-one clocks once a week and forty-one more
once a month, in two long walking rounds across the town and
the outer parish. she kept this ledger in an oilcloth pocket on
her coat. the entries are short because there was no time to
write more: between two clocks she was always already late for
the third.
the right page is the heart of the book — a long, patient list
of each clock's tendency: what it does when she is not
there. some clocks are stable, some seasonal, one is alive to
its keeper. the grandfather
at mrs. p.'s is the only one ever marked, simply, no
fix — meaning it is allowed to run as it will, and the
household sets its day by the kettle instead.
what is missing: the round of the second sunday in october 1949,
when h. milray did not come, and which she has scored through with
a single graphite line and a small dot before the date.
field note · pencil, in the back a clock is a promise. the winder does not keep the time. the winder keeps the promise. the time keeps itself.
see also · the clock room · grandfather clock · clocks · the clockmaker · ticking