Long Nights, Early Mornings

What was it W. C. Fields said?  "The best cure for insomnia is to get a good night's sleep." A family member used to toss that up to me when I'd get up in the morning, claiming little or no sleep.  So I have to remember that, for me, sleep issues aren't anything new.  I'm sure I can still put a few off onto age, though.  Actually, besides being awake for long stretches at night, my problem might be more a circadian rhythm thing.  There are certainly times when I feel my body is on mid-Atlantic time.  I know there are evenings when I've got my light out before my late-eating London friends have finished supper.  Everything for me feels speeded up.  I wake early (like 4:45 this morning), so I get up early.  Breakfast is a reasonable hour, maybe 7:00.  But I start getting lunch ideas around 10:30 though manage to hold off an hour.  Then I have to force myself to wait until 5:00 for supper.  Of course, after that the evening seems long.  I don't watch TV--what is there to watch?  But enjoying a good book, I often get in bed to read only to find my eyes closing.  So I call it quits early ... which then means I wake early.  Isn't that called a vicious cycle?

There was one absurd night when I put down my book and went to sleep around 6:30.  Lo and behold, I had a good night and woke at 8:30 next morning.  The sun was up, I was ready for the day.  But  ... gradually ... something didn't feel right.  I turned on my computer and read the date.  It was still the night before.  The sun was still up because it was the middle of summer ... it was, in fact, just going down.

And then a full moon throws a monkey wrench into things.  Despite window shades, it still seems to shine in.  All that lunar energy wriggling around, going zap, zap, like a magic wand, waking me, and then wanting me to stay awake!

So now here we are switching to Standard Time this very night.  As someone remarked, this bi-annual shift is a pointless aspect of modern life.  Some countries don't observe it--mostly in Asia and Africa.  And then our own Arizona has opted out.  I can remember years as a girl when we simply stuck to Standard Time.  Then people started fiddling with it.  The excuse was that we'd use less electricity.

As of tonight, we're going smack into dark evenings.  How are my confused Circadian rhythms going to handle that?  If my body wakes at what it thinks is 4:45, the clock will say 3:45 ... too early for those of us who aren't dairy farmers or meditators on retreat.  And the afternoon will seem like one long airplane trip going west across the International Date Line when you go for hours and hours and the time never changes.  With the lower winter light, around here, anything after 12:00 noon seems like a perpetual 4 P.M.  Looking out to that low light, I get the impression it's time to start thinking about making supper almost as soon as I finish lunch.  And cocktail hour is a long time coming.  Then finally--whap--the afternoon shuts down (around the real 4:00), I close the window shades, turn on a light, cook supper, and get out my knitting or a book, holding out as long as I can.

Early November when the low light takes over the entire afternoon.

Of course, there's tomorrow morning's clock-changing routine, too.  When adding them up, I find I've got a surprising number of time-pieces.  My computer, cable box, and cell phone change automatically.  But I also have wrist-watches, answering machine, 3 cameras, car clock, kitchen radio, etc.  Fifteen in all.  Most requiring pushing little buttons all with different mode-changing criteria.  (There are so few dials anymore.)  But changing 15 time-pieces is better than the 450 the poor Windsor Castle time-keeper has to adjust--a task that takes him16 hours.

So, between occasional insomnia, Circadian rhythm oddities, and that ole moon, it can be amazing to get through a night at all.  And this time change stuff doesn't help.