By Jo Mooy
The sound of Westminster Chimes is hard-coded into my cellular memories. They trigger ornate family memories that go back to early childhood. Playtime came to a halt when my grandfather came to the formal living room to perform a weekly ceremony that, to us children, was as rich in detail as a British coronation. I can still see him, properly dressed up in island business attire of well-ironed shorts and shirt, a tie, and khaki colored knee socks with tassels on top.
His shiny brown shoes echoed on the polished hardwood as he approached the tall cherry-hued and aptly named Grandfather Clock that had a place of honor against one wall. He unlocked the glass front of the clock and from some mysterious place, pulled out a long metal old-fashioned key. He placed the key into each of the three holes in the clock face. Then he placed his ear against the clock as he wound the springs in each hole, stopping at the right spot. When finished, the key was tucked away, the glass cover locked and, looking at his brood of grandchildren, he said: “Don’t touch it!” Nobody was ever dumb enough to touch his clock.
He left a legacy with that clock because all his children and many of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren ended up owning their own Grandfather Clocks that chimed the same Westminster Chimes first heard in the late 1700s. Four distinct chimes are toned on the quarter, half, three-quarter and hour times. One could build a lifetime schedule around the Westminster Chimes, and the sound would always bring you back home.
My mother didn’t choose to own a big tall one, but rather a smaller camel-back mantle clock. It too governed our lives, always sounding and calling out the hours in the background. Sometimes you heard it, other times hours would pass as though it had no sound. But, it was always there in the background, tolling the time. Perhaps having these clocks was an acquired family tradition. Once, a guest came to stay for the weekend. In the middle of the first night he got up, tried to stop the clock, and ended up breaking the delicate mechanism. After the hysteria of such a violation of protocol and hospitality, he was never invited back.
My Grandfather Clock is also a camel-back mantle clock made from beautiful Colombian mahogany. When I got it 50 years ago, I chose a battery operated model for convenience, deciding the weekly winding ritual belonged in the nostalgic memories of my grandfather. What I didn’t realize, though, was that the “modern mechanism” for keeping time was cheap plastic that would have to be replaced every five years or so.
Recently, the clock began to chime the wrong hour. At 11 it chimed 4 o’clock, at 3 it chimed 7. I debated if it was worth the aggravation to replace the mechanism rather than buying a new clock until I saw the price of new ones. What I thought was a relic of another time was not true. It seems Grandfather Clocks are a “thing” and still very much in demand. I had to fix it.
Waiting for the parts to arrive from some offshore location, the house became strangely silent. What had been a constant toning in the background, noticed or not, was mute. The energy of the clock had gone. I’ve never lived in a house without Westminster Chimes, and not having the sound in the house was like being cut loose from a tether. What were these chimes that were so rooted in my psyche? What spell did they have on me?
The Westminster Chimes are more than just a sound in a clock. They are my family. They are comfort food like mac ’n cheese. They are Big Ben tolling the news when the Queen died. They track the time in the middle of the night when I can’t sleep. They are countless remembrances in my mother’s house. They bring a smile when they chime in a British film. They are the ice cream truck cruising summertime streets. They are my Grandfather’s footsteps sealing a ritual into his lineage. They are a sure continuation of the legacy in the clock at my daughter’s home. They are the past and they are the future. Their four-part sound is my ever-present anchor.
Jo Mooy has studied with many spiritual traditions over the past 40 years. The wide diversity of this training allows her to develop spiritual seminars and retreats that explore inspirational concepts, give purpose and guidance to students, and present esoteric teachings in an understandable manner. Along with Patricia Cockerill, she has guided the Women’s Meditation Circle since January 2006 where it has been honored for five years in a row as the “Favorite Meditation” group in Sarasota, FL, by Natural Awakenings Magazine. Teaching and using Sound as a retreat healing practice, Jo was certified as a Sound Healer through Jonathan Goldman’s Sound Healing Association. She writes and publishes a monthly internationally distributed e-newsletter called Spiritual Connections and is a staff writer for Spirit of Maat magazine in Sedona. For more information go to http://www.starsoundings.com or email jomooy@gmail.com.