TICK, TICK, TICK

Tick...tick...tick. The sound of time. The relentless progression of seconds into minutes, minutes into days, days into lives. Time is many things, not the least of which is a test.

In the final measure, if you don't pass the test of time, you pretty much pass into the same harmless anonymity in which most of us end. To put that another way, we can be today's feature-story, but tomorrow's foot-note all in just one news cycle! Go ahead, ask the features and the footnotes from history for their opinion....

Da Vinci, Mozart, Beethoven, Scriabin, Picasso, Cecile B. DiMille, Bernstein, Tennessee Williams -- they all suffered the slings and arrows of critics whose names and assaults have long been forgotten.Time was the filter through which their art had to pass, gaining glory with each successive generation. That's earning your fame the only way that counts. Over time.

Ideologies are much the same. Zoroasterism, Gnosticism, and Communism have come and gone. Meanwhile generations later, entire courses are devoted to Hellenism, Stoicism, and Transcendentalism. Some ideas make the cut; others fall by the wayside. The rigors of time eventually decide.

Celebrity is always the quickest to fade. Manufactured in the studios of Hollywood, promoted on the late-night shows, and rushed into touring concerts papered with screaming kids and followed by breathless Oprah interviews, these wispy confections are swallowed whole. But then after the proper number of ticks, the screamers and interviewers find fresher candy. You have to have that indefinable something that can stand up to the merciless test of time. Which is why a Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, Al Pacino, Elvis and Meryl Streep stand taller with each tick; while all the what's-their-names show up on the occasional "Whatever Happened To" retrospectives.

Oh, and then there's history. It's pretty much true: Newspapers are the first draft of history. So when we pore over the daily ballistics of angry bickering, we should try listening to those ticks. In the history books, what takes up entire editions today will simply melt into a few passing sentences tomorrow. Sentences that might someday sum up today's daily traumas about reform into something our grandchildren will simply read as: "The Year America Found Its Way Home."

Tick... tick... tick....