It's all dark!

Nah, I'm not complaining about the election. I'm still trying to cope with the end of Daylight Savings Time. It's all dark, dark, darkity dark dark dark.

Approximately three p.m.

It could be worse; President Bush signed the Energy Policy Act in 2005 that moved the end of DST four or five weeks later (depending on the year). So October is not so dark, but now November feels darker than ever. Made for easier trick-or-treating, anyway.

It's just hard to adjust, even if, like me, you've never been diagnosed with seasonal affective disorder. It's hard because it's so sudden. The daylight wanes slowly through July and August and September---then comes the end of DST and the door slams on your face. On Friday you came home from work under the reddened glow of sunset; on Monday you got home from work under curtain of night. It's like the difference between being aging and being diagnosed with a degenerative disease. Yeah, I'm getting older to Wow, I'm mortal.

There is one advantage, though, to getting older and feeling the peel of time go faster, like the famed roll of toilet paper that expends itself more quickly as it nears the end: You actually take comfort in the knowledge that the days will start getting longer again in less than two months. Two months is forever when you're five, a marathon when you're fifteen, a sprint when you're fifty. At my age, two months is barely enough time to get the house clean.

There's still question as to whether Daylight Savings Time actually saves energy, as it was purported to do. (Good piece in Scientific American on that here.) All I can say is, it's done nothing for my own personal energy. More coffee is about the only thing that helps with that.