The clock

Feeling some regret this evening for taking an old clock radio to the Goodwill. After I finished repainting my room, I pushed my very long dresser back up against the wall and put all of the drawers full of clothes back in. Once that was done I remembered I had neglected to plug Mike's 30+ year old clock radio back in. My arms were too short to reach either down to the outlet or around either side to plug it back in. The dresser was far too heavy to move loaded up. I had moved it by myself emptied out and that was a challenge. No way was I going through that again. So up to the attic went the alarm clock. I had a much newer one on my bed side table so I didn't really need that one anyway. The next day I made a run to the Goodwill with some old clothes of mine I came across during the painting process and decided to take the clock as well. Now, however, I'm wishing I had kept it. That clock was a part of Mike. He had it when I met him, of course, since he'd bought it years before. It always worked just fine so there was no reason for him to replace it. Even when his alarm was not on, at the time it was set for, you would hear a click sound. He had it set for 4 am because when he worked at the Oaks Prison he would awake every morning at 4. He didn't work until 6 but he was an early riser and liked to have time to "get his head together" before work. It wasn't loud enough to wake me, but if I was awake anyway I would hear that click every morning at 4 am. Or really I should say 3:50 because Mike always set that clock and the one in his truck 10 minutes fast. The morning he left on that fateful fishing trip he woke at the usual time and, as was his habit, he reset the alarm for the next day. Of course the following morning when it went off at 3:50 it was somewhat devastating to me. It didn't wake me since I had lied there awake all that night. But ever since, if I was awake at that hour I would hear that familiar click and think of Mike. It always sat there on the edge of the dresser and I really never gave it a thought. That vacant spot on the edge of my dresser looks far too empty now for my liking. I'm going to miss hearing that click at 3:50 am every morning.