>>> experiment
disable clocks, watches and alarm clocks; erase or cover displays of clocks on your laptop or smartphone
>>>aims
wake up without an alarm clock
be without schedule
not knowing what the exact time on the clock is
do things that you want or need without a specific plan and without keeping track of the duration of actions
notes and observations
*when using a laptop or a smartphone time and timeeeping is everywhere on display
*I don’t know if I can write this blog without using words that describe time (e.g. morning afteroon, later,)
*I woke up without an alarm clock. My body felt rested.
The first thing I wanted to do was to look at the time. Which I did. —> I decided to stick at the wall to sheets of paper and mark every time I look at the clock during the day and every time I think of looking at the clock.
I also decided to have my smartphone on silent mode because, when I hear a message and try reading it, I immediatly see the time display. Twice a day I will check my phone, calls messages, emails.
I made lists, I drew in lines, I counted sometimes, other times I forgot because everyday life you know; I mean, I made the experimet in my appartment while reading, writing, practicing, editing, eating, talking on skype, drinking coffee, getting dressed. My appartment is not a laboratory. I tried turing it into a laboratory but, then,, you now everyday life.
So I counted sometimes, and there are some numbers to talk about. These umbers have no value according to the traits of scietific eperiments. They cannot be acknowledged as reliale scientific results. So I will tal a bit about umbers and a lot about thoughts, a bit about quantities of time and a lot about qualities of time.
.
Phase three
Day one
I repeat the experiment on September 10 2020
I am in Arnhem.
I wake up and stay in my bed in a limbo for a while. What time is it? shall I get out of bed?
My roommate knocks on the door, twice already, I get up
“Oh, you were sleeping”, she says
I know that she gets up fairly early
She expected me to be out of bed
So what time is it
As I open my laptop I cannot resist
I have to know
it is there in huge numbers
I look at it
Oh my God it is already 12:36 p.m.
During the rest of the day I looked at the clock approximately 8 times. Mostly when I was using my phone
Still I was trying to plan when to do all this stuff that I had schedule to do for today
I don’t know what time it is right now
I guess it is around 10 p.m.
I enjoyed a long walk in the afternoon, I didn’t take my phone with me.
Let’s try not using a phone at all for a day
Oh, it sounds horrifying. What if someone sends me a message?
Days two and three and four
I don’t know how this experiment is going. It is really difficult not to look at the clock, especially when I have an appointment or when I use my laptop and phone to work or to communicate.
I thought on Thursday I would stop using my phone.
It didn’t happen
Aka I didn’t do it
I put it on silent mode for several hours during the day, though.
Oh my God, I depend on technology and on texting apps
On Friday I checked the time several times, maybe 8.
On the other hand, I got lost in the city without clock and with no map and it felt good.
And throughout the afternoon, when I was with my peers I didn’t feel the need to ckeck the time.
According to my observations I mostly think about checking the time when I wake up and after it gets dark. In the morning I think
What time is it?
Did I get up early enough?
When am I going to do the things I have scheduled?
Let’s get organised without a clock
Then after dark I think
Is it time to cook?
Is it time to eat?
As if my body doesn’t know on its own
Is it too late now to walk around the house?
Are my roommates sleeping?
On Saturday there were things that I wanted to do and then I decided not to. I lied on my couch, I had the most amazing long siesta
Today I woke up really refreshed and eager to write!!!
I have checked the time twice until now.
I think it is time to cook.
.
.
Yet another attempt
This is my third (I think, it might also be my fourth) attempt to live without clocks. It is January 7 2021 and while I don’t want to use clocks
how can I take notes for an experiment without a calendar?
I started this attempt yesterday.
From the aims that I have set above I managed to disable the clock display on my laptop and I wake up without an alarm.
I woke up yesterday and immediately I started wandering what time it is. I resisted the urge to look at my phone
I have not managed to disable the clock display on my phone
and
to be honest I am quite afraid to do so.
If I want to know the time where would I look at?
I had a great morning drinking coffee and watching youtube.
What I mostly do in the mornings (when I do not need to rush off to class) is that I have a constant battle between wanting to enjoy my coffee and being stressed about when I am going to start studying. Which is probably called procrastination. During this battle I end up not enjoying much and I look at the clock every 10-15 min. and I think to myself “ok, ten more minutes and then I am going to start working” I do this a few times.
One could say this is a change in mentality and it does not really have to do with the clock itself. All right. It is a change in mentality. Yet I noticed in the previous attempts that the decision to live without clocks led to change of mind. Because things are not simply things. They are thinks. And humans think with them.
Yesterday I looked at the clock on my phone or laptop about 5 times. Each time that this happened was connected to answering a call or receiving a message or email. So, even if there is no clock display on my laptop, each time that I received an email and opened it I could see the time of arrival. The same goes for other platforms such as fb, what’s up and so on.
I also found out what time it is because of somebody else’s habits. My boyfriend called and he said they just had lunch. So, I knew it was about 13:30.
Another thing that I noticed is that I keep organizing and planning activities in my mind. So I planned to study, do yoga, cook, eat, do groceries, study some more, tidy up my room, take a bath. What I actually did was: study, mange, cook, have a talk with my roommate, have a talk with my brother, eat, sleep, study some more.
Going to bed. What I usually do is watch youtube (or some other platform) after a late dinner and slowly dose of on my couch. Very often I go to bed later, even though I am tired, because I do want to watch one more thing. Yesterday I started feeling tired quite early for my bed time habits. I fell asleep on the couch and then moved to my bed. This also happens often.
Today
I woke up because someone called me on fb. I did not pick up. My phone was downstairs. Still I heard the ring and woke up. A few minutes later a got out of bed. I felt very rested. I also wanted to follow a lifestyle advice that had reached me the day before: do not drink coffee for an hour after you wake up. So I didn’t really feel sleepy nor hungry. I started tidying up, doing dishes and laundry. And I kept hearing sounds of messages on my phone and email. I really wanted to check… maybe it is important, maybe someone needs something, maybe it’s about groundbreaking news, maybe someone is waiting for an answer from me right now… None of these were happening. I checked my messages and I looked at the time 2 or three times around 11:30.
Then I had coffee and youtube. And now I am writing about the experiment.
In the afternoon I had an online appointment with a friend. Just to chit chat. I did some literature reading and towards the afternoon I started feeling tired and anxious. I had put my alarm clock to ring 15 min before the meeting. And yet I was anxious. Was it fear I would miss the meeting. How would I? The alarm clock would ring. but if technology fails. There is always a possibility for technology to fail. Or was it anticipation? I had not spoken to this friend for a long time and I really was looking forward to hear her news. Or was it because I was really tired from studying and I urgently needed some excuse to stop working? I felt tired but wouldn’t stop. Because the time for the appointment had not come jet. And did say in the morning that I would work up until the meeting.
Next day
I had to do things online today. Inevitably I was faced with platform that display time. So I just gave up. I used clocks today. Tomorrow I need to be at 9:57 (yes, that is actually the time of the appointment, I have an email, I can show you) at the GGD test-center to get tested for corona. I will wake up around 8. All these days I have not be using a clock. I feel that this makes me sleep better. What do you mean better?
All right:
A few of my habits before this experiment:
Checking the clock very often, which for me means more than 6 times an hour. Of course if I am doing a task, if I am in class or in a conversation with somebody I do not check the clock every 10 minutes. But now that I think about it I realize: there have been times that I was with a friend, having coffee, and at some point I thought to myself “Oh, I have not looked at the clock for so long. I am wondering what time it is. I want to check the time. do not look at you phone. It is impolite when your are in a conversation.” And after this internal monologue I end up apologizing to my friend “Sorry, I need to check the time, I do not want not leave yet, but I haven’t checked the time for so long”. and then I check the time on my phone. On the other hand, when I need to leave the house and meet someone on time, I might check the time every two minutes. The surprising thing is that I am late most of the times. After a days work, I am used to doing youtube, and, when I start feeling tired, I start checking the clock: Is it time to go to bed? No, not yet. I will watch one more episode. Is it time now? 20 more minutes. I should go now, no?. Yes, one more video and then it’s bedtime.” And it goes on and on like this. I am tired but the day is not over yet and do not feel I had time to myself, although I would be too tired to do anything (even sit down and contemplate) if I had more time to myself at the moment and I end up …
And then very often I fall asleep on the couch and I wake up in the middle of the night and move to my bed. I had put on the alarm clock before falling asleep on the couch. And the I often wake up during the night and CHECK THE TIME… is it time yet to get up? Why?
When I do not use an alarm clock, I do not wake up to check the time in the middle of the night. And even if I wake up because I have seen some dream… I do not check the time. Jesus!
So will use my alarm clock tomorrow to wake up at 8. And I put a second alarm at 8:15 just in case. This makes me rally anxious.
So I woke up 3 or four times to check the clock. I wouldn’t say I had a good nights sleep.
Next day
I got the test. I checked the time many many times in the morning so I could be on time. I wasn’t. I mean I found the place on time (two spare minutes). But then I had to look for the entrance for about ten minutes. So I was late. Some signs would be nice.
I decided to do nothing for the day. I mean no studying. Watching Netflix, cooking, talking to people online. At the end of the day I realized: Oh tomorrow we start the residency. It’s Monday tomorrow. Oh, I do not feel stressed. I feel I had a full day’s rest.
Tomorrow
I used an alarm clock, because today is the first day of the residency. We met at 9 online. So the alarm clock rang and I did not want to get up. I felt tired. I pressed snooze a few times and then I got out of bed at 8:37, I think. And while I sat in front of my laptop, holding a cozy hot cup of coffee in my hands, I checked the time and I had 8 minutes to myself, before the meeting, to enjoy my coffee watching YouTube. And do feel the need to explain myself… you know about youtube. Is it the only other thing that you do except of work? It seems the answer is yes. I grew up in the 90’s. I am a TV child. But when I feel rested there are also other things that I enjoy doing.
So I worked for 4 hours and 20 minutes and then I had lunch and had my siesta watching Netflix and had coffee again. An then I worked for another 3 hours and 30 minutes. And around 20:00 I decided that this was a good days work and I would stop studying now. I felt proud of myself that I had woken up so early and had worked so many hours during the day. An I felt that I deserve to finish work just before 20:00 today. Feeling proud of myself depends on the amount of hours that I worked?
I had 5 cigarettes to day. Usually I smoke 3.
Next day
No alarm clock today. So I woke up a few times and I looked at the window. The first time it was too dark. The sun had no risen yet. But the nest time I woke up it was really grey and I could not make out if it was time to get out of bed. I wanted to stay in bed. I felt tired. It’s the second day of my period. My body needs to take it slow. I really wanted to know what time it is. At 13:30 we have a meeting with my peers. I need to know how much time I have until then to study. 8:49. Oh! It’s extraordinary. When I wake up without an alarm clock, It’s usually between 10:30 and 11:30. Really proud of myself for waking up so early…
performance practices_divergent temporalities 