Some years ago an Indian Chief was addressing his tribal elders. He was attempting to explain daylight saving time to these grizzled old Indians. He said that white people are the only ones he knows that can cut a foot off a blanket and sew it to the other end and think he has a longer blanket. Now as silly as that sounds, it kind of makes sense. The people that favor the time change prefer to have more daylight in the evening for partying and shopping for adults while leaving their children in the cold dark morning waiting for a school bus. Sounds pretty sad doesn’t it.
Every year when this matter comes up, it creates discussion. The politicians choose sides based on what they think would be politically correct. And then there are us, the great unwashed. I never favored changing the clocks anyway.
Some of you may remember a piece I wrote concerning time. Time has always been, but measuring time is a human invention. In the animal kingdom dinner time happens when hunger meets opportunity. Bedtime occurs when tiredness meets a snug den and you wake up to start your day when the sun hits you in the eyes. Humans set their alarm clocks in order to interrupt a peaceful night sleep because…..it’s time to go to work. We invented the alarm clock for just such an event. The clock serves two purposes, one to tell us what time it is and number two, to shatter us into consciousness when it’s time to get up.
When we were primarily an agrarian culture, plant and animals controlled our lives. When it was time to plant, we did and then when it was time to reap, we did without any help from a clock. A lot of our time rules, i.e. work time, bed time, meal time, etc, were started during this period. Now we live in the city. We buy our vegetables and eggs at the grocery store and they are available year round.
If I were given my choice, I would leave time alone and not change anything. And I think many of the people who think like me would agree to leave time alone.
Ron Scarbro March 20, 2023
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