How delightful that we gained another hour of light at the end of today, thanks to "falling back" from Daylight Saving Time, in the United States anyway.
This bonus from frugality is a treat, especially if you've suffered through endless public wrangles sometime about the merits, or not, of setting the clocks forward in the Spring–to enable such generosity for this day in the Fall.
Tussles over the terrors of time adjustment can tear at local communities–some call theft what others call a gift of extra sunlight, to play or get extra chores done in daylight.
Everyone seems to have an opinion. In an early local debate in Australia, one of the louder advocates for not messing with Tempus Fugit was a politician who, as a former farmer, knew a thing or two about messing with "rules of nature." He was especially knowledgeable, he said, about when the cows expected to be milked!!
Amid others' commentaries were when children needed afternoon snacks after school, and, of course, the extra hour of tropical sunlight would fade the curtains.
You think I'm making this up? 'fraid not–perhaps you heard equally preposterous polemic pressing panic buttons locally in your community (but hopefully not).
During deliberations on so momentous a proposition, the media generously sustains ever-prescient insights about the pros and cons, seeking to elevate each skirmish of the debate into a gladiatorial battle. Rarely was so much expended by so many about so little, as for the potential losses and gains from adjusting just sixty minutes. And thankfully some playful commentators added parody and humorous quips to the debate.
This raging public discourse for the politician was, of course, more than harmless diversion. It was just one more of the many mock controversies he stoked. His polemic helped distract attention and energy from dismantling the gerrymanders and electoral malapportionment he'd quietly installed.
Sounding familar?
Frequently he was re-elected with a smaller number of votes than the state's two other major parties. He kept his leadership and his political party in power in coalition with one of the other parties–benefiting also from a preferential voting system. He maneuvered this with about 20 to 27% of the primary vote for five elections before defeating the "coalition party" decisively in two more elections. All this and more kept him in the driver's seat for almost 20 years.
Unfortunately, today's time adjustment doesn't provide an extra hour for voting on Tuesday... so, best plan now, which five people–neighbors, family, friends–you can help get to a voting booth (where this is still permitted by state law!!), to cast votes in the poll that matters.