Adjusting to the Time Change

I have a hard time with daylight savings time in the Fall.  “Falling” back in time in general doesn’t work for me.  My preference is not to go back, it hasn’t served me well in the past.  The real issue is that I feel extra tired extra early with sun setting so early, every day.  I long for my evening walks at dusk.  The smell of grass.  Dog at my side.

But this time of year really screws with my internal balance mechanisms and I feel like the world is slightly tilted.   I’m ready for bed by 9 pm.  Now my college buddies or cousins would probably not find this surprising…as I was always ragged on for hitting the sack early.  Hey, I like my sleep, and it didn’t help that I didn’t make the drinking age cutoff at school.  But I digress.

I spend a majority of my time at this computer, working my day job.  I’m not complaining, I’m fortunate enough to have a home office and I love my commute.  But ask anyone who’s been in the presence of my office for any period of time, and they will tell you it’s anything but peaceful.

I sit in basically a major traffic zone in my home.  It screws with my good chi.   My husband operates his construction company in the basement, so they come up and down for this and that.  My mother comes over to visit as she & my Dad live in the inlaw residence.  Her visits often happen at the most inopportune moments when I can’t really talk to her, which makes her mad at times…Sorry, Mom! 🙁  Then we also have my daughter Valerie and my grandson JJ who is 2, who are also around during the workday and add to the distraction level.

So, as we approach this coming Sunday’s time change, I’m struggling with the balance of things.  Good news is that after Sunday we can start moving toward the better, more light days.  Let’s just get it over with. Like the election.  Everyone is on edge and it’s time to move forward.

I do try to savor every moment, but they even find me there. Just tonight I decided to take a shower and no sooner was I in there when my son knocked on the door.  It went like this:

“Hey Mum, there you are….I know what I want to be for Halloween.”

<<Squeak, door opening into the bath.>>

ME:  Oh yea, what is that?”

“I am going to be a prisoner.  A prisoner with a guitar.  I thought that since my guitar strap looked like it was from a prison, I would be a prisoner rock star. ”

ME (wondering why we are having this conversation now):  “Are you sure about the prisoner thing?  Those two images of a rock star in prisoner garb isn’t a great match”  then  silently thought well, yea it really does…

“Well that’s what I want to do, be a prisoner with a guitar walking around.”

ME:  Ok, if that’s what you want.  It’s your night.  Ok, well is that it?

(Now the big sell job) “Well, I was just wondering…like when can we go to the store to get the rest of my costume? It’s only a few days away<…pause….silence ….>and I was thinking that maybe we could go to-..”

ME: Cut him off with “Well, I can tell you I won’t be jumping out of this shower to head to the costume store…is this really the best time to discuss this?  Let’s finish this later….”

—end

If its not one thing, is another.  Second story is what we call the “Eyelash Incident”:

My son and daughter were in the bathroom together, he was brushing his teeth for bed, and she was getting ready to go out.  She was curling her eyelashes with one of those eye curler things, and my son thought it would be “funny” to tweak her arm so she moves her hand.  What the clod didn’t realize was how hard he “flicked” her elbow up and she ripped out 85% of her eyelashes.  They were still on the curler.  OMG, poor thing!  That almost started WW3.  Until he locked himself in the bath, which of course did wonders for that scenario.   This was very upsetting to my daughter, as she likes to be put together.  This of course affected her entire night. There are still a few remnants of drama lingering.

So with this as a stage and my home office’s exclusive box seat, I have to remember to take a minute and give myself a moment to catch my breathe and balance myself.   Especially during Daylight Savings Time.   Extra TLC is required to make it through.  Otherwise snappage could occur.  And that won’t be pretty.

Until next time…