Or so it seems this time of year when the days,
incrementally growing shorter quite nicely all on their own, suddenly start leaking light at
4:30 and leap off into an abyss of total darkness at five o’clock as they will
a week from now when daylight savings time ends.
I do not take kindly to abrupt change of any sort,
but I’m especially sour on the idea of losing an hour of daylight. Yes, I know it’s an hour that, according to
the sun, I was never entitled to have in the first place. At best, it is a loan, but why must the loan
come due all at once? Who pays their
bills that way? I’m a big proponent of
the “minimum payment plan.” If I had my
way, we would move the clock back two minutes a day over a period of 30 days
for a nice, civilized slide into December where, on the 21st, we have
the official shortest day of the year, and then “Bingo!” The days start getting longer again!
Can I get a “Hoo-ah!”?
I envy people who are productive at night. I’m not one of them. Once darkness falls, I’m done for the
day and all I want is booze, food and
sleep. Long, long ago and far, far away
in the land known as my youth, I would rise at eleven, start to get going at
around one, and drag my partied-out ass in at three o’clock in the
morning. Now, however, I rise with the
sun, my work day ends at six, leaving plenty of light for a little reading on
the deck, then dinner with friends, a bit of television and I
hit the sheets around ten. There are really only two hours of darkness I need to fill. It works for
me.
Although there is no fondness in my heart for
George W. Bush, starting in August of 2005, he did give us an extra four weeks
of DST. I could have almost forgiven him
the Iraq War had he made it the law of the land year round, because such is the
degree of my self-interest. Every year
at this time the question is floated again about doing just that, but then
people start bitching about their kids going to school in the dark to which I
say, let them sleep in. School shouldn’t
start before nine anyway. Why should I
be inconvenienced?
But I’m not one to wallow in my misfortune – well,
not for long anyway. I will instead
choose to see the pony in this pile of manure:
I’m a morning person and so what I lose on the back end of the day, I
will gain on the front end and, if I don’t adjust the clock by my bed, I can
fool myself in those first groggy moments into believing that nothing has
changed at all. And hey – it does, after
all, move up cocktail hour.
Besides, there’s really no way the Iraq War is
forgivable.
Do you
welcome the time change or go kicking and screaming like I do?
