I used to hate the changing of the clocks to and fro twice annually, but now I really dig it.
Maybe that’s because that’s the kind of guy I am — I change my mind about things. Or maybe it’s because now, that decisions have been made to get rid of that practice, I’m starting to see what a precious thing it really is — the changing of the clocks to and fro, only because that’s the way it was done in some distant past, for reasons that are now lost to memory.
Daylight Savings Time, with its “falling back” and “springing forward” (which just occurred), used to strike me as an unnatural and unnecessary artifice, a man-made construct that only furthered our dependence on the tyranny of the clock. But now I see the opposite is true.
The friendly and benevolent clock somehow feels the pain of our daily lives, and kindly stops for an hour, once a year in the fall, and we wake up the next morning feeling psychically healed, well-rested and strengthened, ready to face adversity.
This is not unlike Joshua asking God to hold the sun still in the heavens (Book of Joshua, 10:12-13) so that the Israelites could finish the slaughter of their enemies the Amorites. Actually, now that I think about it, it’s not like that at all.
“Hold on, horologophile,” I hear you, dear Reader, say. “If the clock is so benevolent, as you suggest, what about the ‘spring forward?’ If the clock were so kind, why would it allow such suffering? Is not, in fact, the ‘fall back’ that brings such relief from pain, more the standard practice of the torturer, a Gestapo tactic that induces us to ‘sign the papers,’ so to speak, out of relief? And thus we continue our blind obedience to a malevolent and machiavellian chronometer?”
Nonsense, I say. We are not the wild deer, wand’ring here and there. The human soul needs tempering. The spring forward is designed to give us wisdom and depth. The fall back gives us joy and exuberance. We humans need L’Allegro and Melancholy, Yin and Yang, Tick and Tock — though personally, I can do without the Melancholy, Yang, and Tock.
Enough of this debate. I am fully prepared to advocate — by using my position, enormous influence, and immense prestige — that the changing of the clocks by one hour actually take place every week, Saturday at midnight, throughout the year. This would have a soothing effect not unlike a three-day weekend every week — well, actually, it would probably have the opposite effect, as every other week would be like having a three-day weekend.
Still, wouldn’t it be great to wake up, once a fortnight, saying “Wow, I’m glad that week’s over. But now I feel great, and am looking forward to the week ahead.”
Of course, who really looks forward to anything anymore, what with us scurrying hither and yon, in blind obedience to that malevolent, uncaring … I mean, gracious and kindly clock.
I’ll go further, and suggest that the clock be switched every midnight, forward one night then back the next. This would serve to give us one good night’s sleep, after a restless, sleep-starved previous night.
Additionally, it would assert our domination over that clock — may it be forever damned — that rules our every second, telling when to eat, sleep, wake, work, and worry, driving us all crazy with its tick tick tick, as if it were saying “See? Another second of your life vanished, like a puff of smoke.”
On the other hand, having our times change every day would inevitably lead to chaos, although I believe a certain, small degree of chaos promotes creativity and resilience.
Actually, now that I think about it, I don’t believe that at all. The resulting anarchy would bring crashing down in shambles our society, so carefully constructed on increments of time ordained by the clock, and then we’d indeed all be like the wild deer, wand’ring here and there, except we’d all have guns.
See what this Daylight Savings Time has led to? See what the decision to get rid of it will lead to? It’s introduction into our lives, way back when, was planting the seeds of our doom!
On the other hand …