The Value That Numbers Can't Measure

Not all hours are equal, even though the clock says they are.

It was Sunday. The grocery store was noisy and packed. I offered my sympathy to the cashier. “But does it at least make your shift go faster?” I asked.

“At times,” she said. “But then there’s the last hour. That last hour is definitely sixty minutes.”

She didn’t mean the minutes were literally longer. Everybody knows sixty minutes is the exact same quantity of time as an hour. She was expressing the paradox that those two things are not at all equal, especially when you’re anxiously counting down the minutes.

The last hour is equal to all the other hours. It’s also much longer. How can both of those statements be true? Because there are different kinds of value.

There are quantifiable, metrical values; four and four is eight; trees are plants. And then there are paradoxical, felt values, like the old saying, “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” Both are real, but we often forget the second one, which may matter even more.

Patience can’t be bought. Love can’t be measured. An old growth forest is more valuable than the price of all its timber. A single smile can carry more weight in a life than a million dollars.

What is something you’ve experienced that was more valuable than its quantity?