Tuesday, June 22, 2010

There are a number of reasons I do not care for Daylight Saving Time.

One of them, lately, is that during the "long-day" part of the year (and we just had the longest-daylight-day yesterday), if I want to go to bed at all "early," it's so bright out I have to pull out the black eyeshade I use when I travel.

It makes me think of Robert Louis Stevenson's "Bed in Summer":

In winter I get up at night
And dress by yellow candle-light.
In summer quite the other way,
I have to go to bed by day.

I have to go to bed and see
The birds still hopping on the tree,
Or hear the grown-up people's feet
Still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you,
When all the sky is clear and blue,
And I should like so much to play,
To have to go to bed by day?

But, unlike Stevenson's eager-to-play child who feels cheated by the sun still being up when he is sent to bed, as a tired adult, I feel that it's somehow not right that I should WANT to go to bed at 8:30 some night, and have it be too bright to sleep.

I feel like I shouldn't have to put up blackout curtains in my bedroom (do they still even make those?) just to be able to catch up a bit on my sleep in summer.

Summer teaching is kind of exhausting, so some nights going to bed at 8:30 does look attractive.

2 comments:

Kris said...

DST needs to GO AWAY, in my opinion. The original reason for it is no longer an issue. Plus, it just takes me so long to adjust every time... I do so much better if my bedtime is fairly regular. Geez, I sound like a geezer or something. LOL

purlewe said...

I too hate DST.

Blackout curatins are on sale at JCPenny's website right now. It was a discussion in our knitting group on monday.