Spring Ahead - or Back?

 

I don't know if you have adjusted to less sleep and more light over the past three days, but I certainly haven't. No matter what the cause or the rationale, "less sleep" is never a better option than more sleep. We have been created to take a well-deserved break for a few hours within a regular twenty-four hour period. You might call it the "every day Sabbath of the body."

The "more light" advantage, on the other hand, is one that bears discussing. I suggest to you that the more light, the better. The only exception to that rule is when you're trying sleep with less light when you are used to more light. (Hold on: it's to get crazy in the next few lines.)

One reason why a March Daylight Savings Time (as opposed to the decades-old April one) appeals to me is that it should theoretically save money. (Horace, let me explain: Less power used means less power billed. Okay?) So anytime one can save money, this is good.

I would also add that with more daylight – both earlier in the day and later in the evening – there is a greater opportunity to be more productive. I believe I should have added the word "theoretically" to this reason, as in "theoretically, one should be more productive with more natural light." That would mean, again, in a theoretical sense, that there would be more time to travel, weed, jog, paint, and build – tasks that are nearly impossible when moonlight has replaced sunlight.

A jog in the dark, one might say, is no walk in the park.

I have also been told that more light is simply better for one's health. It is a proven fact that we tend to get more sick during the winter than we do in the summer. That could be for a host of reasons, with lack of natural sunlight being one of them. Vitamin D, as you know, is the best cure to a sunshine deficiency, next to the sun itself. So, if there is less sun, there must be more pills – not a great trade-off, but a reasonable replacement.

Finally, dangerous things are done more often in the dark, so "more light" should – again, I use the word "theoretically" - mean that this world is a safer, kinder place when we set our clocks ahead. But if we are cranky with less sleep, and we have some object in our hand, the world may not be quite as safe as we want it to be.

But with Daylight Savings Time comes Nighty-night Savings Time, too. Because it is hard to sleep when it is light out, it is likewise hard to crawl into bed any sooner than midnight. When it is light out, it's hard have lights out.

One simple, almost idiotic solution to the light out–lights out dilemma is to wear blindfolds anytime after 8: 00 PM. Maybe not a great idea, especially if there are walls and doors and toys

and people to maneuver around. You might get to bed early, but it would likely be a hospital bed – especially with all those potential hazards. Simulated darkness produces simulated sleep (ie., not the genuine thing), so one won't get a really good night's rest.

I am discovering, as I talk it up with friends, that less sleep needs no help from the powers-that-be. In other words, I am finding all sorts of people are having enough trouble either struggling with getting to sleep in the first place or getting back to sleep once they have woken up. The only exception would be teenagers on Saturday mornings – or actually any morning, for that matter. For them, Daylight Savings Time can come and go, but sleeping in just carries on.

So I am convinced that Daylight Savings Time is actually not necessarily a really obvious positive event on our calendar. It makes for passing news in our papers, fodder for this column, and confusion for the common man ("Is it spring forward and fall back – or the opposite?")

In the meantime, I will move my bed to the cellar – and keep my blindfolds ready, just in case.