Living on the Edge

During the many years that we lived in Land of 10,000 Lakes, we were more or less in the middle of the Central Time Zone. Now, however, we are close to the eastern edge of the Eastern Time Zone. This has several ramifications, most of which I experience without fully understanding them. In other words, I’m pretty much talking through my hat here.

However…. I hardly ever watch television any more. We just have “Limited Cable” – enough to keep from having to send Onkel Hankie Pants up on the roof, but that’s not the only reason. Chiefly, I have not been able to get used to the East Coast version of prime time, which doesn’t start till 8:00 pm. Things I used to watch at 9 are now on at 10, and the ten o’clock news comes on at eleven! Can’t be doing with that, so I just skip it.

Telephone conversations with my daughters in the Central and Pacific Time Zones can be problematic. I have finally internalized the fact that Pacific Time is 3 hours earlier than here, not later. It just seems counter-intuitive.

But of course the main thing is daylight, or at this season, the lack of it. Fortunately I do not suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder, or I’d really be in trouble. Postponing the end of Daylight Saving Time until November 1st seems to have made things worse, not better, because we’ve had less time to get used to the early darkness. Yesterday we got the tail-end of Ida rainstorm, and it was pitch dark outside at 4:15 pm. Rusty’s after-supper walk is always in the dark now (I hope for no pickup duties on this walk, since he seldom wishes to do his “bidniss” under a streetlight). Oddly, I find that the early darkness does not help me get to bed at a reasonable hour, rather it skews my perception of time so that I find myself staggering off to bed close to midnight.

I just checked, and according to the Weather Channel, we actually had 5 minutes more daylight here than Minneapolis (but 29 minutes less than Berkeley, CA). However, the sun rose and set about half an hour later in Minneapolis, giving the illusion of a longer day.

People in Downeast Maine (Eastport, for example), which is not only North but East of us, have it even worse. Many of them would like to see Maine adopt the Atlantic Time Zone, used by our cousins across the border in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, or just maintain Daylight Saving Time all year round. I have to admit that I also dislike the days in early spring after we “spring ahead,” because my preference would be always to get up with the sun, but sometimes I have to get up ahead of it, especially when DST has just begun. I suppose there is no solution that will please everybody. And now it’s time for bed.

Friday Five: Time Out Edition

Sally in the UK, writing for RevGalBlogPals, reminds us:

Holy Week is almost upon us, I suspect that ordained or not, other revgal/pals calendars look a bit like mine, FULL, FULL, FULL.....

Jesus was great at teaching us to take time out, even in that last week, right up to Maundy Thursday he withdrew; John's gospel tells us he hid! He hid not because he was afraid, but because he knew that he needed physical, mental and spiritual strength to get through...

So faced with a busy week:

1. What restores you physically?
Sleep. I have to remind myself to get enough, which really means going to bed at a reasonable hour. Sleeping in just doesn't work for me. Naps can be useful, but in a busy week, they normally can't happen.
2. What strengthens you emotionally/ mentally?
Reading breaks! My busy week will be coming after Easter, when Onkel Hankie Pants and I will be training for census work. It will be my first 40-hour work week in several years. I also expect it will be fun and interesting, but you know I will have a paperback in my purse to read at lunchtime!
3. What encourages you spiritually?
Thinking about the RevGalBlogPals who are actually "RevGals" and all they do.
4. Share a favourite poem or piece of music from the coming week.

Well, this is the one that has to be sung on Maundy Thursday. Another time I posted the Johnny Cash and the Carter Family version; here's another quite different, an 8,000 voice Welsh male choir. I sure do love those Welsh choirs!

But I couldn't resist adding another one; this is an instrumental version of a song I sang in my only choir experience, at the Sunday school in the fire station back in 1958.

5.There may be many services for you to attend/ lead over the next week; which one are you most looking forward to and why? If there aren't do you have a favourite day in Holy week? If so which one is it?

Actually there are just three, and I only have to attend them, no other responsibilities. Of Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Easter, each has its special moments, but over the past many years my favorite has been Maundy Thursday. Last year I attended that service for the first time since I moved and joined a new church. It was different from what I was used to; a fairly small attendance, and a more meditative feel, less traditional. But I liked it. My problem with Easter at this new-to-me, much larger church, is that even with two services instead of the usual one, it's very, very crowded with C&E attenders, and I can expect all seven (!!!) musical groups to perform; it's one of the days when I feel more like a spectator than a worshiper. The Maundy Thursday service is just the opposite.

Friday Five: Time for Palms

Over at RevGalBlogPals, Mother Laura asks:

Can you believe Daylight Savings Time is here already? It's hard to get used to the new, earlier onset. My family has been getting up and out a little late and a little sleepy in the mornings.

And can you believe that in two days it will be Palm Sunday for Western Christians? Our Lent is almost over, while our Orthodox sisters and brothers, whose liturgical year follows the older Julian calendar, are just starting theirs. Nicholas did a recent book report on George Washington, and we were surprised to find out that our first President's birthday was originally Feb. 11, since he was born just before the change to the Gregorian calendar. Apparently the change almost caused rioting, as some indignant people were sure that they were being cheated out of eleven days of their lives!

(Mother Laura featured a music video of "Ride On, Ride On in Majesty" which is lovely, but this is still the song that I think of each Palm Sunday. In my one choir experience at the firehouse Sunday school, we sang this -- pretty ambitious for a bunch of fifth-graders!)

To help you adjust--and enjoy the process--here's a Friday Five about time and transitions....

1. If you could travel to any historical time period, which would it be, and why?
This is a hard one -- so many choices. And a lot would depend on where as well as when. But I think for my first time travel experience I'd want to go to New York City in the 1920s, in some capacity where I could hobnob with the early staff of The New Yorker.

2. What futuristic/science fiction development would you most like to see?
That's easy! Time travel!

3. Which do you enjoy more: remembering the past, or dreaming for the future?
Well, I certainly have more past than future at this point! And I do enjoy remembering, researching, reading and talking about the past. Yet, I still enjoy dreaming about the future. And of course, the future is as yet untainted by regrets and might-have-beens. So I'd have to say the latter.

4. What do you find most memorable about this year's Lent?
Once again, as three years ago, my church is undergoing transition and self-examination. (A different church this time.) With my former church, three years later all concerned are in a very good place. I hope and pray that will be the case here in three years, or even sooner.

5. How will you spend your time during this upcoming Holy Week? What part do you look forward to most?
We will have a Taize worship service on Thursday, and a Tenebrae service with special choir music on Friday. And of course Easter Sunday will be a big celebration. Of the three I think I most look forward to Thursday, at least I hope that it will be the deep experience of Maundy Thursdays past. I will miss, still, our old custom in City of Lakes of having a Holy Saturday breakfast and Bible study -- and not just because of the hot cross buns!

Even if you don't blog yourself, you can answer some or all of the above questions in a comment!