#263 Lost in Time

Among the many regional variations in our language is the term daylight saving time. But it’s hard for me to say. We always said daylight “savings” time growing up. I was from a farm family—that group of people daylight saving time is said to be helping. By the way, the daylight saving time website says that the “saving” in daylight saving time is a verbal adjective. It modifies the word “time.” It’s like saying it’s cow milking time or hair splitting time. You don’t say it’s grammarian chokings time. You say it’s insufferable know-it-all choking time. So, daylight saving time, invented by Benjamin Franklin, was originally created to take advantage of the longer days of summer by moving the clock forward in such a way that it was lighter further into the night. What was eight o’clock in the evening and light would now be nine o’clock and light. Eight o’clock would be lighter. Here in the great Northwest, that means that at 10 o’clock when you’re, say, trying to go to sleep, it’s still annoyingly light out there. Measurements were done and it turned out that indeed, there were energy savings by having to burn less candles and watt-ever at the end of the day because even though it was darker at the beginning of the day, less people were up to be discomfited by that darkness. The only people that were fool enough to get up at 4:30 were radio disc jockeys, essay writers, dedicated runners, and, um, farmers. Before I address that, here’s the funny thing; time is an entirely arbitrary system of measurement. We could have 100-minute hours and no one would care—once they got used to it. It would make a lot more sense too, a microwave could count back continuously and not skip from 100 to 59. So a recent study done on daylight savings—excuse me—saving time is a little telling. It concluded that daylight saving time actually saved energy throughout the year. Even in the winter. Having that extra smidgen of light on shank of the day conserved energy in December as well, just not as much. Well why the heck shift back and forth then? Us three people that wake up early are used to waking up in the dark anyhow. We’re used to the shortening and lengthening of the days by season. And the late risers they don’t care. In the northwest winter, you can sleep in till nine and still get up at the crack of dawn. So why complicate matters? I mean jeez, the only reason I keep the clutter of my appliance operating manuals around is because I can’t remember how to reset the clocks in ‘em twice a year.
And the farmers? They get screwed no matter what. They have to go to bed when it’s still light, cause guess what? The chickens and the pigs get up the same time anyhow. Go figure. Chickens and pigs not reading clocks. It ain’t natural...
America, ya gotta love it.