The Seth Thomas wall clock always hung high above on the wall of my mother's bedroom. Along with my parents and their ten kids, this clock traveled several places, wherever my father was stationed as a civil servant. It coexisted with my mother in the last century for more than 50 years till she passed away. My father bought it in the late 1930s.

It was one of few mechanical marvels I used to stare at during my childhood. I was always fascinated by this clock, with its swinging shiny brass pendulum, its beautiful dial, two slick hands, a glass door with brass frame, polished wooden case, and its secrecies inside. I would rush near the clock whenever it struck the hourly bell producing the familiar gong sounds. It is not a gorgeous timepiece like a Grandfather Clock that plays Westminster chime melody. Still, its hourly pronouncement in lugubrious ding-dong tones, so used to my ears since my childhood, is lovelier than any clock chimes that I ever heard. And its "Tick-Tock" sound for each swing of the pendulum makes it as lively as the heartbeats of a living body.

Each Sunday before lunchtime, my mother would climb on a stool, take the key from inside the pendulum case, wind up the clock, re-set it if it ran slow or fast, and gently swing the pendulum. Nobody was allowed to touch the clock. I used to beg my mother in vain to allow me to "help" her wind it, or at least to let me swing the pendulum. But as mother grew older, she was too weak to climb up the stool to wind it up. The job of weekly winding was shouldered on me.

The hourly bells echoed in our entire house. We heard the bell even when we would stroll on the roof. It was audible from anywhere inside and outside. The Tick-Tock sounds of the clock, especially at night, were an incessant, steady assurance that all was well day and night.

Mother died in 1991. And while the clock still hung on her bedroom wall at our Gandaria house, it was quiet and still. The heart of our house no longer beat. I left Dhaka for Kuala Lumpur. The clock became an orphan. It however found a shelter on the staircase wall at my eldest sister's residence. It was just a showpiece there. My sister died in 2002. My nephew tried his level best to repair the clock. Unfortunately, he could not find the original spares and the right clock man. I got tired of requesting my nephew either to get the clock repaired or hand it to me. One day, my beloved nephew sent the dead clock to my apartment. My eyes misted as I laid the clock on a table and looked at its listless body---the body of my childhood buddy.

I explored my connections to find out the right mechanic to diagnose the clock's fallibilities. Discovered Mr. Naim, the 67-year-old mechanic with 50 years of experience who is known for his golden hands. His ancestors are from Uttar Pradesh in India. He found the clock inflicted with multiple injuries: the mainspring cracked, the bell spring fatigued, the escape wheel damaged, the locking device preventing overwinding missing, fragile dial, and other wrongs. Required spares of this 100-year-old American wall clock could not be found locally. I then moved heaven and earth and finally sourced the spares that did cost me a fortune.

Nevertheless, life has been infused into the clock on 07 November 2021. She is once again heralding the hours by "Ding" .... "Dong". Like a belle dancer, the pendulum is swinging from left to right with a "Tick" at one end of its swing, and a "Tock" at the other end---in perfect beat, balance, and rhyme. I felt elated to find the clock agile once again in perfect shape and function. It is a feeling you get when you meet your dog who was lost for a long time. You want to cry when your dog jumps on you and wags its tail in joys of reunion.

I have restarted winding the clock up on Sunday. Before I shut the glass door, I breathe in the smell of time inside the case. It smells like yesterday. It smells like my mother's hand. The nonlinear, nonverbal part of my brain tells me that the clock was waiting for my intervention. If this clock had been a living being, she would say: "At the end, I am at your safe custody, dear Maswood. I was so sick, my mechanical inners felt so badly after so long a time of neglect. I now can breathe. Thank you."

The writer is a retired banker and a freelance columnist.