Falling Back

I am currently living my favorite hour of the year. Sure, anybody can have a favorite season, or a favorite holiday, but I can narrow my favorites to a single sixty-minute unit.

Falling Back

I feel sorry for those poor Arizonians who don't get to experience the twice-a-year time shift. Sure, there's a little bit of excitement that first evening after Springing forward when it's, like, 9 o'clock and still bright as noon, but there's nothing like this hour right now. 10 p.m. on clock change night, realizing that, in a sense, it's really only 9, and you're going to get an extra hour's sleep.

A brand-new, un-wasteable, un-deserved hour. A gift, really. The gift of time.

Think about it--how often during our week do we wake up wishing we'd had an extra hour's sleep. Or need a little more time to finish a project. Or wished we had more minutes to spend in meaningful conversation. And tonight, we get that.

Technically, I suppose, we get that hour tomorrow. The purists among us would say so. But I'm no purist. And I'm impatient. I'm snagging my extra hour the minute I close my eyes, and tomorrow when I open them, I'll be so rested, so grateful, so utterly giddy with joy--like I've gotten away with something wonderful.

Then tomorrow night, darkness will fall earlier than it has in months. And the days will feel so short, and the evenings so long--all the more reasonto curl up a little tighter and live a little closer to home.

Ah, the grace of time.