It’s a matter of time

Why mess with clocks anyway?

Islept like a baby, knowing that church and I would meet at the appointed hour, because I was prepared. Before retiring the night before, I had set my watch and all the clocks in the house forward one hour—using the time-honored formula for the end of Daylight Saving Time: Fall Forward, Spring Back.

I arose at 9 a.m., took a leisurely shower, grabbed a robe and went into the kitchen. As I stood at the counter waiting for the kettle to boil water for my instant coffee, I looked for the millionth time at the postcard a real estate agent had sent me. In big bold letters, it read, DON’T FORGET TO CHANGE YOUR CLOCKS ON NOVEMBER 2. I blinked, momentarily confused, then relaxed, thinking, So I took care of it a day early. That’s good, right? Right.

I poured my coffee and shuffled back to my bedroom. Sitting at my vanity table, I relaxed and took a quick look at the clock: 9:25, plenty of time to get ready for church. Running a comb through my dripping hair with one hand, I punched the power knob on the radio with the other. “The time is 7:25,” the announcer said. “If you haven’t already set your clocks back for the end of Daylight Saving Time, do it now.”

Do it now? “Hah!” I said to the radio guy. “I’m way ahead of you.” Then, casting a doubtful glance at my mirror image, I thought, Wait! Did he say 7:25? I replayed his words in my mind (the existence of which I was beginning to doubt). Set the clocks back, he said. That would mean that it is now … 7:25, like he said.

Of course. Fall Back. Spring Forward. I looked around, half-expecting the ghost of Allen Funt to jump out of my bedroom closet and say, “Smile! You’re on Candid Camera.” Hey, I thought, I have time to finish the ironing, go for a walk, take a home IQ test. Then I set my watch and changed the clocks. Again.

That was last year. This year, I am going to be ready—if I don’t get sidetracked imagining The Donald gone, baby, gone. Not from Actual Life, you understand—I’m not that mean— just from the Republican Mob Scene known as Insulting Your Way to the Presidency. (However, in the event that Trump has already taken his billions and fled the country by the time this essay appears, I have asked the editors to delete this paragraph.)

But getting back to the subject at hand—am I the only one who has wondered why we started messing with time in the first place? The website of the Institute for Dynamic Educational Advancement has enlightened me on the subject. It is really too complex to get into in the space of this writing. Let’s just say it had to do with railroad schedules and local times and even sundials. These days, it is further complicated by the fact that some cities and states observe Daylight Saving Time (DST), while others have disdain for the whole idea.

For example, Arizona does not use DST, but the Navajo Nation (parts of which are in three states, including Arizona) does. However, the Hopi Reservation, which is entirely surrounded by the Navajo Nation, does not. That means that, effectively, there is a doughnut-shaped area of Arizona that does observe DST, but the “hole” in the center does not.

Then there is the matter of proper terminology. Daylight Saving Time is the official term. However, some people insist on referring to it as Daylight Savings Time. According to the aforementioned Institute, “many people feel the word savings (with an ‘s’) flows more mellifluously off the tongue.”

The fault lies with improper grammar. The word saving, as used here, is a participle, or verbal adjective. It modifies time and tells us that it is characterized by the activity of saving daylight. “It is a saving daylight kind of time,” says the Institute. Similar examples would be dog walking time or book reading time. Since saving is a verb describing a single type of activity, the form is singular.

Now I agree about the grammar part. But the guys who thought up all this stuff were wrong about one thing: no daylight is actually saved—it is merely shifted from one part of the day to the other. However, it does feel like extra daylight, and it saves a little on electricity.

Ben Franklin was the first to link daylight with economy. One day, after accidentally waking at six o’clock on a fine Parisian morning, he claimed to be astounded to learn that sunrise provided many hours of natural light.

Citing the potential savings in candle wax (he had labored over the calculations), he wrote a letter to the local paper suggesting that all the churches in Paris ring their bells at sun-up; if that was not sufficient, he proposed firing cannon on every street. “Force a man to rise at four in the morning,” he wrote, “and it is more than probable he will go willingly to bed at 8 in the evening.”

But Ben, that old womanizer, doesn’t fool me. It was not candle wax he had on his mind. After all, as one pundit claims, Franklin’s favorite proverb was “Early to bed and as often as possible.”

Now that is a maxim worth living by.