"don't try to beat time"

in the words of some forgotten song of the 80's, "time is just a creation, of man's imagination." how else do you explain something like daylight savings time?

to be clear, i don't mind dst. in fact the only time i really dislike it is when it starts each spring. i love the fall back portion. i think we should do that every friday night! we could make up for it by "springing forward" every monday about noon.

honestly, i used to think, why bother? lets just get rid of it. we have electricity, we don't care what time sunrise and sunset happen. how many farmers are left? they get up early anyway... they can continue that rugged tradition of rising with the sun and working all day. how does the rest of the world being one hour behind really effect them? they don't know or care. they can do everything they need to outside of daylight hours anyway.

now i work, and enjoy having the extra daylight to do stuff after i get home from work. that is part of what makes summer so vastly superior to winter! so i just go along with it, and don't complain.

except for the "spring ahead" phase. it doesn't matter what you do. you change your clocks and go to bed early, and all that. the result? you lost an hour, and you're tired, and it takes your body a few days to get used to it. (unfortunately the extra hour in the fall doesn't seem to register on the body at all.)

well, i now have a child in school, so the frustration grows. "time for bed!" we say. "it's not dark!" they reply. have you ever tried to explain this little bit of time manipulation to a five-year-old? not easy. i know we'll be fighting that for a long time to come. especially in a month or two when sunset won't even be close when we send him to bed!

alas, it doesn't end there. dst has thrown off my exercise schedule. despite my foot pain from last tuesday on the treadmill, i faithfully rode the exercise bike wednesday and thursday. i was up plenty early on friday, but had to leave for early meetings at work. (i'm sorry. i flatly refuse to get up before six unless: (1) the house is on fire, (2) we're leaving on vacation, (3) no. i guess it's just the two.)

anyway, i fully intended to keep going with my exercise. however, not only was my body off an hour, i had a really restless night. i don't know what the deal was, i just didn't sleep. knowing the way my brain works, i kept thinking, "i've lost an hour, morning will come soon, i must sleep!" which of course you can't do. at least i can't force myself to sleep. it has to just happen.

so at six this morning, my alarm goes off. i had honestly looked at the clock at like four-fifty-something. (and two-something, several one-somethings, etc.) i was dead tired. plus i was finally sleeping. i reset the alarm for seven and went back to sleep. and i slept.

tomorrow, i'll try to get up at six again. (unless i have another restless night...)