A woman of my acquaintance has thrown away her watch and decided to have nothing more to do with clocks. ''I have freed myself from the tyranny of time," she says. She has had it with bourgeoisie, middle-class punctuality. She will now live as if every day were a vacation at the beach.

Something in me would like to be her, free from time's tyranny, measuring time as did my ancestors -- through the gentle passage of seasons, sunrise and sunset, not seconds, minutes, hours, punching in and punching out.

I have been conditioned into the chronology of the academy. I used to wonder why faculty meetings lasted so long. Days, weeks spent discussing, evaluating, pondering. The Dean announces that coffee hour has been changed from ten to ten thirty.

“Well, I believe we ought to reflect upon that,” say…