When the clock strikes 10

The chime comes at 10 every night.

Originally, it was to remind me to take my medication before bed, but I haven’t needed it for years. I just take it whenever I’m ready to head upstairs.

Even though the message with the chime is still about the medication, it has become a cue of a different sort — to feed my cat Sasha.

Several years ago, Sasha was being pesky while Suzi was trying to sleep, and since Suzi couldn’t ignore her as easily as I do — the cat never pesters me in bed, because she knows I’ll just roll over — a diagnosis and solution were required.

The diagnosis was that Sasha was hungry. It was one thing when she pawed at Suzi not long before one of us got up, anyway, but something completely different when it started in the wee small hours.

The solution? Feed her at night. Hence the chime becoming a message to feed her instead of medicate myself.

Sasha may not have had a clue as to why that noise was coming from my phone every night, but it didn’t take her long to figure out that not long after it happened, she got food.

So now, if I’m not on my feet and headed to the kitchen by the time the chime is over, she’s looking for me, and she gets very annoyed if I keep her waiting.

Once I went to college, it took me a while to learn that maybe people started to think about doing something at 8, and things don’t really start until 10. Where did we get all the energy from?

For part of my childhood, bedtime was at 9. I don’t remember when that ended, what bedtime was after that or even if I had one.

But I do remember that if we were going to visit family or friends in the evening — just show up, and if they were home, hang out, if they weren’t, go home — if we weren’t doing it by 8, we weren’t doing it.

Once I went to college, it took me a while to learn that maybe people started to think about doing something at 8, and things don’t really start until 10. Where did we get all the energy from?

Then, of course, the pendulum swung back the other way, and now 10 feels like the end of the day.

I spent a lot of nights hanging out with Vin Scully. Not really, of course, on account of us never having met and my living 3,000 miles away. (Although wouldn’t that make an awesome story?)

However, after the Yankees games ended, usually around 10 or so, I’d check to see if the Dodgers were at home — Scully worked mostly home games by that point — and if they were, I’d stream at least the first few innings.

I’m pretty sure I didn’t see his treatise on the history of beards, but I was watching the night he weaved the origin of Rockies catcher Yorvit Torrealba’s first name between pitches.

Basically, one parent liked Yorman, the other liked Victor, so they combined them, but it was a lyrical story in Scully’s hands. Yor-vit-Torr-e-al-ba … it was practically singing.

It was actually weird turning on Dodgers games when I was in Los Angeles a few years ago. Games started at 7 local time; I could actually watch the whole thing if I wanted to!

The stroke of 10 really feels like the end of something on Sunday night, both because Monday is next and because since between “Succession” and “Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy,” 9 on Sunday became an hour of must watch TV.

The second season of Tucci’s travels is on right now, and although I’m enjoying it, and will be happy if there’s a third, something about it felt … different … and it took me a while to figure out what it was.

It’s a really good show, but the first season aired during the pandemic, when almost nobody was traveling, the world pretty much existed only as far as you could walk and culinary adventures were pretty much bound by where you could get takeout.

As all that was going on, as most of us weren’t living much of a life at all, here was someone living his best life. It was intoxicating, as opposed to being just an excellent way to spend an hour on a Sunday night, because of its time and place.

And I don’t really feel that way about anything else I picked up during the pandemic.

Once 10:00 hits, I still sometimes try to find West Coast games, or something else to fill the time. However, I try not to get too invested in anything in particular on TV, because what if I fall asleep before it’s over?

Scully’s retired now. I was actually at his last home game.

Once 10:00 hits, I still sometimes try to find West Coast games, or something else to fill the time. However, I try not to get too invested in anything in particular on TV, because what if I fall asleep before it’s over?

The smart thing to do would be to use the time for reading. The smarter thing to would be to go to bed, especially since I’m tired a lot of the time.

However, going to bed means the day really is over. Some days, that’s promising, because whatever bad happened that day won’t be going to bed with me.

On other days, though, it means that the next thing I do will be starting over the next morning, and I’m not quite ready to do that just yet, so staying up lets me put if off.

But of course, some time after the chime goes off at 10, I call it a day.

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