It’s not fair. The sun won’t rise today until after 7:00! Someone stole an hour away from me last weekend that I will spend the better part of a year getting back. And by the time I get it back, it won’t even feel like payback; it will be as if someone dropped an hour on me from nowhere, for no reason.
Why we mess with the clock like this has long been replaced by other reasons. I hear it was originally done so that farmers could have more daylight hours to work in their fields. Now it’s so we can get in an extra hour of soccer practice.
I never have understood why we have daylight time when we do. We have it on the half of the year the days are already longer anyway. Why don’t we have it on the other half so those short days of winter don’t seem so short? That would make sense — even things out a bit. Wouldn’t it be nice to have the sun go down at 5:00 in December instead of at 4:00? As it is, we make the long days longer and the short days shorter.
Maybe we just shouldn’t mess with it at all. Why mess with time? What gives us the right? Who decided this anyway? A bunch of folks in Washington? Why do they get to wake me up at 3:00 this morning and call it 4:00? Am I going to be groggy until October when they arbitrarily decide to give this hour back?
What about the rest of the world? Turns out only North America and Europe do this, plus small sections of South America and Australia. Everyone else leaves it alone. Smart people.
God stopped time once. He didn’t do it with the clock, and He had a good reason. “So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, as it is written in the Book of Jashar. The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day” (Joshua 10:13). Now that’s significant.
Right now, I’d be happy to just stop time for an hour so I can go back to bed. Get my hour back. It’s a long way to October. But like so many other things, I need to learn to absorb the loss. Keep on going. Keep on believing. By the time October rolls around, I will have forgotten all about this feeling of loss I have right now, and getting my hour back will seem like a sheer blessing. So be it.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. (Job 1:21)
John Fischer The Catch 
John – You get up at 4:00 a.m.??? If I’m up at 4:00 a.m. its because I never went to bed in the first place 🙂
I totally agree with you, John. I grumble about DST every spring. It makes no sense and takes away light at my favorite time of day, early morning. I appreciate someone else thinking it’s a weird sort of control.
You may be losing an hour in the morning but we are gaining an hour of sunlight in the evening.
Just another example of government in action. I think I am becoming anti-government……
I am always, no matter what time of year, on my way to work when the sun comes up. I like the extra hour in the evening during the summer. It gives me time to play or be effective about my Lord’s business in the light outside of my normal work hours, for those few months. 🙂
John, I, too, dislike DST, but mainly because of all the clocks that I have to change – we have 12 assorted things (appliances, cars, watches and house clocks). I grumble the whole time I am changing them, but I really do love the longer evening hours of light sitting on my deck enjoying the bird chatter and time spent catching up on the day with my husband. Time flies when your having fun even if we don’t eat dinner until 8:30! My husband said we would need to move to Arizona to avoid the DST….I have thought about it, but think I’ll stay in my native North Carolina. 🙂
I love DST especially when we Spring forward. I love that I can sit outside until around 9:00pm enjoying the beautiful nature around me. Makes the day so much longer to enjoy. In winter whether it’s 4:00pm or 5:pm – dark is dark – hard to enjoy outside in the dark… So now we all know – JOHN DOESN’T LIKE DST because he can’t sleep an hour longer!! Too funny – wish you enough! By the way – How does Marti feel about it?
OK. You guys all win. What can I say? Marti’s with you.
You are so right about this. I have a clock on the furnace that I will have to find the manual in order to change. Probably have to go on line to find it then figure it out. We’re talking about 30 minutes or so here, and when do I have time or that?. Then eha clock on my car is still wrong. I will have to get out the manual for that too. Oy vey.
I love getting more daylight in the evenings. When it’s dark, I go to bed. I get up at 3:30 and so the longer evening is so nice.
Yes, but that makes 3:30 even darker!
I seem to recall that I read somewhere that someone (perhaps at NASA) was doing calculations on the rotation and orbit of the earth and came to an anomaly a few thousand years ago. The anomaly in the calculations could be answered only by Joshua’s Long Day.
Does anyone know where that info is?
In regards to DST: I read once that an old Native American Chief said “Only Government would think you can cut one foot off one end of blanket and sew it on other end, and make it longer”
This made me smile!
TimC, that’s urban folk lore.
I like the later hour. It’s great for sailing during the week and Golf.
http://www.webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/c.html
Aha. Thanks. Do you have a link to info on that?
http://www.snopes.com/religion/lostday.asp