In defense of time

Of course, now that this is known, it won’t be long before AI-driven schedulers and time optimization apps flood Facebook Ads. I have to wonder if AI is secretly making the same snarky comments that ALF creators Tom Patchett and Paul Fusco had in mind when their extraterrestrial protagonist had to learn how to use a watch.

Bending time. In many martial arts, time isn’t something you detach from through deep meditation and breathwork. Instead, it’s about recognizing time’s subjectivity — how one’s sense of it shifts relative to those around them — and learning to use that to one’s advantage. AI struggles with something as simple as reading a clock, while martial artists train for years to perceive time differently. In both cases, time remains elusive.

Seeing Republicans stall a House vote on the Trump tariffs until Dec. 18, 2025, only underscores how malleable time really is. And are we not still trapped in the absurd ritual of resetting our circadian rhythms twice a year despite voters passing a law to end daylight saving time years ago?

Not a neutral force, but rather a tool too often wielded by those in power. Perhaps it’s less about the ticking of the clock and more about who gets to decide how everyone else experiences existence.

Time as control. I don’t retain many movie quotes, but I love this one from Wonder Woman. As Steve Trevor checks his watch, Diana in her infinitely naive fictional wisdom asks, “You let that thing tell you what to do?”

What likely started as humanity’s attempt to understand the universe has somehow degraded into charging clients by six-minute intervals and refusing to recognize a calendar day for fear of going on record.

Yes, we let that thing tell us what to do.

Time as chapters in life. For the third season, bald eagle couple Jackie and Shadow have embarked on the roller-coaster ride of parenthood. Last week, they braved a brutal snowstorm with 80-100 mph winds and more than 2 feet of snow. But to everyone’s dismay, the nonprofit Friends of Big Bear Valley confirmed that one of their eaglets didn’t survive.

Still, Jackie and Shadow continue to tend to their two remaining eaglets. And across countless screens, people continue to live-stream the nest, projecting human emotions onto the pair — perhaps seeking to help themselves close one chapter and begin another.

When I had my first child, the best advice I received was, “The days are long, but the months and years are short.” And oh boy, were they right. But I don’t remember those long days, they blur together. As the presence of discrete time melted away with the years, what remains are stories — chapters, if you will — that define the arc of my life. Maybe that’s just what we have to do — search for meaning in what’s left, the chapters and the stories within.

Time as our enemy. During undergrad at Cal, I wrote my senior thesis on time as a cognitive plane of existence, questioning whether the passage of time where people lived entirely different lives online and in the real world was cognitively similar to what happens in our brains when loved ones begin slipping into Alzheimer’s or dementia. The brain remains functional in both worlds, while reality is fractured in two. 

And as time fractures our grasp on the present, it leaves room for others to rewrite the narrative — and for predators to take advantage. Scammers know this all too well. The meteoric rise of pig butchering scams — where fraudsters groom victims before draining them of their life savings — disproportionately target the elderly, preying on their trust, isolation and waning ability to detect deception. Every day, people lose thousands to millions to a well-rehearsed con artist who can make the heart feel young again and time feel like it’s going in reverse. 

But time only moves forward, indifferent to what we lose along the way. And while we can’t stop its passage, we can take responsibility for how we navigate it — who we protect, what we safeguard, and what we refuse to let slip through the cracks. 

Maybe, in defense of time, we should stop demanding it answer to us and instead focus on what matters: the stories we create within it, the protections we put in place for those most vulnerable to its passage, and the meaning we extract from its inevitable forward momentum. While ending daylight saving time, of course.

Annie Tsai is chief operating officer at Interact (tryinteract.com), early stage investor and advisor with The House Fund (thehouse.fund), and a member of the San Mateo County Housing and Community Development Committee. Find Annie on Twitter @meannie.