One Hour

Twice a year, we all come together and argue about one hour.

In November, we “fall back” and set our clocks one hour back to Standard Time. Then in March, we “spring forward” and set our clocks one hour ahead to Daylight Saving Time. Both days are an opportunity for endless articles, clickbait, and opinions. Allow me to join in!

But first, let’s read a few headlines. CNN posted that “Permanent Daylight Saving Time will hurt our health, experts say.” This article references a bill passed in the Senate to make DST permanent; in other words, we’ll spring forward and never fall back again. This is a bad idea, according to CNN’s “experts.”

Over at the Wall Street Journal, we could read about a handful of folks who “opt out” of the bi-annual ritual and just stick with Standard Time. 

And finally, the New York Times summarized it as “a tradition to grouse about it if you hate it, gloat about it if you love it, an annual event that, like many things, soon shall pass. As Scott Prunty of Clyde, Ohio, wrote, with perhaps the most sensible bit of advice, ‘Accept that it’s out of your control and move along.’” Smart thinking, there.

Here’s my hot take: I love it. I look forward to falling back and to springing forward.

When we fall back, we recognize that winter is around the corner. In New England, the leaves are falling, and we enjoy a few final warm days as a stolen treat. It will be dark by late afternoon, and as the days creep coldly closer to the winter equinox, nightfall will arrive earlier and earlier—until December 21, when the days will start getting longer again, by about one minute per day. We’ll have turned the corner, length-of-day-wise, and though it will be winter, there’s a certainty that soon it will be spring. And then there’s that almost magical day in March, when we spring forward, and we know that summer, and late sunsets, are right around the corner.

One can chose to complain, dreading that twice-a-year one hour adjustment. Or, one can make a different choice, a positive one, and crave those November and March Sundays as milestones that offer opportunities to be grateful for our time.

I do feel badly for my intellectually-challenged chocolate Lab, though, especially on the day we fall back. She can’t read a clock, naturally, and she gets really frustrated—pacing, panting, staring, circling—when her dinner is delayed an hour. But her approach is a good one: she doesn’t whine, she doesn’t write a blog post, she just waits and adapts. I could learn from that … :)