My life should not be counted in the ticks of a watch
00:00-13:00 hours
When I was old enough for my time to be exchanged for currency—of cash and golden coins—the age where I no longer wished for my teeth to escape my head, or pray I would stumble upon a quarter forgotten on the sidewalk on my journey to and from school just to gain something of my own I could use without directions—time began to wrap itself around my ankles. It slowly nipped at me, asking to be tended to. Threatening it would gnaw at me so much, I lost my ability to move. Time acted on its threat, and left me immobilized, until my parents would scream on sunny Saturday mornings—too glorious to lay in bed— to get up and get dressed, and start my chores.
As soon as time became a measure of physical worth, it transformed into something wasted or spent—but never earned. In the only-moving-forward motion time could be unspooled, ladled, offered, but never given back. The acceptance of this hasn’t registered in my joints, which are constantly asking me to go backwards, even though time twists my connective fibers and spine as we move forward.
I was grown in a city where neighbors were always offering. When rain thundered, rivers overflowed—threatening to ruin hand-me-down couches, golden harps plucked for Dvorak recreations, and rooms full of records that listed every crime committed in the county.People poured out and formed assembly lines to fill bags with sand, so others could keep their valuables safe—a shield against contaminated water. Any available mom, who had a stretch of time available, gave out snacks to the neighborhood children, providing needed sweetness. The neighborhood seemed to grow extra eyes to watch the ongoings of the sidewalks, surveilling to make sure nothing bad could happen. Snacks were given out to the kids in my neighborhood by any mom with an extra hour on her hands, generously providing needed sweetness. Eyes always borrowed to watch the ongoings of the sidewalks, so nothing bad could happen.
14:00-18:00 hours
Yet time was stingy. Allowing only so much to be done in each measurement. The counting had more stakes than the correct calculation of sandbag to water volume and door height. Hour-long spaces broken into 15-minute increments of units in which I should practice instruments perfectly—as my saxophone teacher was always reminding me, “Perfect practice makes perfect.” Each note incorrectly fingered, ended with a wasted second that I could not get back. Such a slender measurement to get to perfection. It always took too long to be as glorious as my parents asked for me, and I seemed to fail in time. In my failures, time put its nipping pressure on me, knotting my shoulders each time I made a mistake.
I allowed time to feed on my body. It was a jealous ruler and demanded so many things. Careful use, careful placement, careful words. A wrong afternoon spent following whims could lodge itself as reminders of all the items I did not accomplish. Time asked, “Couldn’t you have spent that time solving something useful? Being obedient to your family? Serving your brother a warm lunch?” Time I spent not eating latched onto my stomach, forcing out heaping growls, as the balance of time asked me to ponder if filling my stomach or studying was more worthy.
19:00-23:00 Hours
The aches of time followed, where seconds became scrutinized. In my first office job, I carried a tracking device in my pocket so the owner could know the second I was within the perimeter. I was not permitted to speak out loud, as any utterance could be a disruption for another, causing a mis-use of seconds. I sent a silent notification asking permission to use the restroom, which was timed, and if I was not back at my desk in five minutes or less, someone would be sent to look for me. I learned there was a hierarchy of time and mine was the least valuable. My boss, too important for manual labor or menial tasks, made me squat in heels and skirts to put her office furniture together. This is when I learned that time was more valuable than a lost screw.
Time gained a new measurement—stress. While I had felt the nipping of stress growing up, stress was something only adults were allowed to carry. Not being able to handle something was labeled as disobedience. My ownership over stress only granted and recognized with age, moving through the standard measurements of time. Each unit could now cause me physical pain that I noticed more accurately. Unlike the dull bites and annoying cycles of thought loops, time now crammed itself into each inch of my neck in such a way, it broke me out in migraines. When migraines took root, I was forced to halt and step out of time. No productivity could be leeched. The only possibility was lying dormant in a dark room with no noise and no stimulus. The gnashing time ate through my skull and injected me with guilt for not being perfect enough to withstand it.
The Ticking Stops. The Seconds Hand Bends. The Minute Hand Halts. The Hour Hand Vanishes.
More recently, I’ve been able to sidestep time’s clutches. Stepping into my queer identity has meant a reckoning of time and an acknowledgement it was never the unit for me. I learned about Queer Time Theory from“Minor Feelings” by Cathy Park Hong, and later validated my understanding of how I could not move through time. The theory states that queer people are not bound to the standard order of time where milestones are measured in moments crystalized by heterosexuality. Milestones queer people are not always able to access: the moments where an adult is recognized in marriages, home purchases, promotions, children—then aging as they watch their children meet the same markers that defined their life. Queerness has meant removing myself from the trudges of time. I know I will not meet the goals outlined before me. I know that for my family of origin, this means that I will always be stuck in adolescence, not forming a nuclear family of my own, not getting married to have children, or purchasing property.
I know there are so many joys in these steps of life. So many people find deep meaning within them. I celebrate my loved ones with homes and nuclear families, making silly faces at their children and sitting in the awe of their growth. Yet, I know that with each achievement comes with new ties that knot a responsibility for others. Not one that can freely be loosened and left. But one where the beating of time is always raging as someone else calls for immediate attention.
When I was a live-in nanny, time fell apart and became the goosebumps I’d grow in the repeated words to convince a four-year-old to please, please eat the rest of the blueberries. There is never desperation like there is when trying to convince a child to eat. The midnight moments I’d spend washing musty milk bottles and folding tiny shorts and striped collared shirts after everyone else had gone to bed were an embarrassment of isolation. My friends, awash in the glow of their early twenties, did not understand the weight I carried, and how, when I was able to return, I could not be touched. In the hours I racked up in care, I’d lost my desires. What the children and parents wanted were what I wanted, and a clean house and the shine of perfect family were still goals I needed to work to achieve.
Removing the barriers and benchmarks capitalism placed on me has allowed my spine to unwind and slough off the heaping weight it had been carrying in expectations. I understand my family of origin will always treat me like a child, acting in anger when I do not follow their advice—meant to move me closer to the markers of adulthood they recognize. I make peace with the fact I will never be the child they desire.
But I relish the new messy freedom. I love how unknotted I am. I will never obtain the enlightenment of perfect practice. I remove myself from perfection as an obtainable goal if only enough time is spent. In this liberation, I learn how to love deeper and more tenderly—now that time isn’t forcing a measurement of that unit. Time, which meant both love and labor, dissolves. Before, I could only show my parents I appreciated them by washing clothes, doing dishes, mowing the yard, when they specified and how they specified with an immediacy that proved their worthiness—I now linger in my acts of care. The amount of time I spend with someone has no bearing on how deeply I feel for them. In the stinginess of time, I limited my care. Unburdened from measurement, the how and why, rather than the when became the more important questions. I also break myself from the rules of childhood that state obedience, action, and efficiency are the best ways to show love.
Instead, I use care and judgement in picking only the sweetest most vibrant vegetables to make a steaming cauldron of butternut squash soup, only measuring in cups and tablespoons so I can deliver it to a recovering loved one. The loved one worries about how much time I spent and I say not to worry. Time doesn’t press into the act of loving. On days where my friends are dealing with the painful judgements from bosses, the pile of mundane taskwork in an ever-burdensome way, I send a gift card so they can get a treat for themselves and not worry about the act of dinner. This act takes no time at all, but the care is felt all the same.
Infinity
I stretch out the occasions I spend with those I love. Lingering in their company, in the shines of their brilliant faces, in the bells of their belly laughter. I have an increasingly hard time leaving, not wanting to leave an untended moment on the table, nurturing the words stuck in mouths to be released. I have all the space until what needs to emerge finally grows and latches.
The afternoons spent in bed are now love notes I scribble on each of my limbs, so they do not seize in the pressures of time’s pain. While I will never be able to divest from the fact of a human body, the gnashes of guilt are no longer able to consume me, and I linger in bed in peace.
Someone in my reading group brings up the concept of time, “I know we’ve only known each other for a few months, but in how I measure it, we’ve been together for years.” This is what I understand. The depths of understanding unlock a new dimension where our faces loom and our stories sprawl. In the places I am tending to, there is always infinity to pull from.
Not moving to the demands of attention, and moving in my own way, I am able to continue the act of placing my own needs forward. I nurture myself first. I take so much time in my bath, my toes turn white in wrinkles and my fingers are so waterlogged I cannot use the touchscreen of my phone. I create elaborate meals, baking cakes with all homemade ingredients—lavender simple syrup, lavender milk soak, blueberry jam shocked with organic sugar and lemon zest. Deliciousness is more important to seek, and tastes better than pretend perfection.
I still age, but the grey hairs do not bother me and I let them grow untamed in their shaky texture. I still feel the pull of gravity always trying to sink me to earth. Both without the pressure of meeting a goal not built for me, I move more slowly. Instead, I want to live a life where my body is feasted on by ocean waves, a life filled with kisses from lovers, strangers and friends. A life filled with tripped steps, lingering afternoons, cups of tea cooled in the distraction of conversation.
I exist outside the clicks of a watch, outside of its snaps, outside of its demands. Now forever is a new possibility. Now limitless is in my vocabulary. I no longer look for time under my pillow, on the sidewalks. I no longer force it to unfold and worry about how to untangle it. Time can feast elsewhere. Let me feast on other delicious morsels.
Rae Rowe is a queer, non-binary, gender-fluid, Viet-Am, child of a boat person-refugee, writer, movement worker, creator, and future ghost who uses hir work to explore inherited trauma, liminal spaces, auntie whispers, and connect with community. Rae is a 2025 Periplus fellow and 2025-2026 Loft Mentorship Series fellow in Creative Nonfiction. Rae has received support from Studio Luce. Rae is also the co-founder of The Paper Lantern Project: An AAPI Gender & Reproductive Justice Mutual Aid Fund and Arts Movement which centers care and creating new narratives around these topics while working towards forming new futures of true liberation. Rae currently lives on unceded, ancestral lands of the Dakota people in Minneapolis, Minnesota.