“Let’s make fall back and spring forward ‘at one time.’ At one time we changed our clocks twice a year.”
This weekend brings us the worst day of the year.
Fall back. Ugh!
This means it’s time for my semi-annual rant about time change.
I know what many of you are thinking and let me address this right upfront. On the surface falling back and gaining an hour of sleep sounds a lot better than springing forward and losing an hour of sleep.
That’s called short-sighted thinking.
For those of you who have heard my complaints about springing forward an hour, you know I struggle for a week to adjust my body to the time change. I hate it.
But it’s only a week. Once adjusted, I enjoy daylight savings time for the next seven or eight months. When we fall back, I might get an extra hour to sleep for one night, but then I have to deal with darkness at five-thirty or so for the next several months.
Give me year-round daylight savings time or give me death! Okay, maybe I used a little hyperbole, but I’m serious about the injustice that is time change.
If you think I’m wrong or misguided, let me ask you this: Why should we continue to change the time? I’ll bet most of you didn’t have a good reason immediately pop into your mind.
And that’s my point. We have literally changed the time twice a year for my whole life and I can’t explain why we do it. Neither can you.
Sure, there are a lot of topics I am passionate about, so why focus my laser beam on time change?
Because it’s stupid.
I guarantee, once time change is eliminated—and mark my word that the rest of society will eventually catch up with me—our descendants will look back and ask, “What were people thinking when they changed their clocks for all those years?”
It’s such an antiquated idea. Maybe, MAYBE there was once justification for it, but that time has LONG come and gone and there’s no good reason for us to continue.
Yes, we’re all used to it because most of us don’t know any different. But like I said, there’s no good reason. Because we’ve always done it this way is NOT a good reason.
At one time we paid taxes to England. At one time we went outside to use the bathroom. At one time we got around using a horse and buggy. At one time I used to root for the Cowboys.
Let’s make fall back and spring forward “at one time”. At one time we changed our clocks twice a year. Let our descendants laugh at us but at least our generation did the right thing.
Let’s shed the tyranny of the federal government forcing us to adjust our clocks. Arizona and Indiana don’t change their clocks. It’s time Kansas follows suit. If enough states get on board we can force Congress’s hand.
Maybe it starts with something smaller. Maybe Harvey County could take a stand, or even smaller—Sedgwick, Newton, Halstead, Burrton, or Hesston. Someone needs to stand up and refuse to cower to this horrible injustice.
But until then, as long as we continue to change our clocks back an hour in the fall and forward an hour in the spring, I will complain about it in my column.
Because that’s the way it’s always been.
