It’s Later Than You Think
A.V. Walters
I suppose I’ll settle into it and adjust; I do every year. But I suffer from Daylight Savings Time confusion. If I’m saving daylight, do I earn interest? If so, how can I collect? Yes, I know there’s supposedly increased productivity, but it’s robbing Peter to pay Paul. In exchange for dark mornings and extended evenings, I get to feel tired and, when I look at the clock, confused. In a week or so, I’ll be fine. When did daylight savings kick in so early? I thought it was a summer deal, and there’s still a foot of snow on the ground.
The biggest insult in it is the semi-annual adjusting of the clocks. Some of them do it automatically, some need to be nudged. One year I manually changed all the clocks, and then ended up an hour early to appointments. How was I to know that my devices were automatic, and maybe smarter than me? Better, I suppose, than doing it in the fall and showing up late.
I’m trying to get beyond the artificial construct of time. That’s not surprising, given that I already feel so far behind. I’d wanted to get a roof on the cabin before spring rains, but the guys I wanted to hire decided to sit out the winter, this year. We need help, because, after I broke my rib last fall, Rick doesn’t want me working up high— (too clumsy) and he cannot do it alone. And the guys we want to hire? They say they’re getting too old to work in the deep cold. Hey, they’re a decade younger than me—what is that saying?
I lie awake nights, running through all the steps needed to build. Do we have tar-paper? Should we use Tyvek instead? (What we’ve always called Yooper siding.) Did I get enough cedar shakes to do a chicken coop, too? With all of this pending, when will I find time for the garden? I’ve spent the winter locating good deals on building materials. I have to stop though, because, until we attach some of this stuff, we’re running out of places to put it. It’s amazing how much volume goes into the construction of a house. Worry doesn’t help. Logistically, Rick really has a handle on this, so why am I awake at night?
The alarm went off this morning and I had to lie there and ponder; does my cell phone update to DST, automatically, or is it really later than I think?
tworockchronicles 
What should you care, you have not even adjusted from California time yet. What is another hour one way or another?
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I know that one hour seems minor when we’re are already three hours off but this isn’t just about time, it’s about light.
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That is not my point. You already ignore the concept of time, so why should this bother you? I mean, for me I do have to get up earlier as I have actual time constraints and timing issues and must deal with the public on their time frame. But that is not always the issue with you, in fact since your primary business is still in California and you eat at the most unusual times anyway, why even adjust?
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Interesting Point.
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After sleeping on the issue I finally have it. It is not daylight savings time that is the problem, it is the days are actually getting longer. There really is more lighted time during the day and to top that off we are actually getting sunshine and it is not over cast with snow clouds.
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And I’m loving every minute of that. Of course, sometimes that means we end up eating even later than we regularly do. As for our strange time sense, I read recently that the “three square meals” concept isn’t about human needs so much as it is about fitting eating into the standard work day and food marketing. We’d be healthier to just eat good food, when we’re hungry. This whole business of clocks is the problem.
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Great post. I–oddly–adjusted immediately. Not my usual reaction. Probably because I have a cold.
Your rant about time brings to mind Margaret Meade’s wonderful ‘Letters from the Field’. She lived with and studied primitive (using the word in a literal sense) tribes in the early 1900’s. When well-meaning westerners tried to give them clocks, they didn’t like them. They told time by the sun’s position in the sky (hands of time above the skyline) and other natural devices. I loved it.
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We tend to live clockless. People think you need a clock to regulate activity. I think you need activity to regulate time.
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