Time Change

I have been consoling myself lately with Ecclesiastes 3, the famous passage from the Bible that says "To every thing, there is a season..." Sure, it made a groovy song in the 60s, but this is also just profound advice. There is a time for every purpose, great and small, wise or wicked. However set those times may be, however, it seems governments the world over are not content. It seems that even Denmark is not immune to the idiocy of "Daylight Savings."

I realize there is a history and yes, sort of kind of, a purpose for the time change. The only thing it has ever meant to me, however, is that we lose an hour of evening light in winter. Of course, in Florida, that doesn't mean much, particularly when every single winter day brings a glorious gift of sunshine so abundant and clear and brilliant, that each morning fills with bird song and squirrels help you tie your apron into place...

The descent into the winter season here in Copenhagen -- whose nearest neighbors are countries like Sweden, Russia, Norway -- is a little more profound. By my calculations, we've lost something like six hours of light in four months. It's amazing, actually. It makes me wonder exactly what sort of position we're in, here. Where, exactly, are we in relation to the sun?



That's a picture taken by the "lakes" here in Copenhagen, around 2 pm. These days the sun doesn't get up much higher than that. It comes up over the buildings, and then slides along sideways for a few hours before dipping back below them. And it's only October.

Aside from the sadness of losing the sun -- of feeling guilt prickle over the years of light and heat I often complained about -- I find this whole process somewhat fascinating. And just a little bit ominous. People here talk about "winter" as if it were an animal, a beast to guard against. "Be careful..." they say; "Just wait."

Theoretically, I'm going to learn a lesson, here. To everything there is a season, indeed. A time for light and a time for dark; a time to get, a time to lose. A time for plane tickets to Florida, and a time to gather your flip flops together.