Tempus Fugit…..and I Fidget

I had been writing columns for Sid Riley’s newspaper for only a short time and was chiefly concerned with the first charge that he gave me: “Tell the folks about the three rivers”. So I told about boats and barges, about river pilots that I knew and of life on the banks of the flowing streams that came out of Georgia and formed the Apalachicola River between Chattahoochee and Sneads.

Then I branched out and related vignettes of my life, both as a civilian and as a Navy man. My fame seemed to grow. At least it grew enough that Sid became somewhat ashamed that he was placing my column farther into the morass of articles, sometimes behind the “Partners for Pets”. I urged that he put me closer to the front page, because I don’t believe even William Faulkner, that famous Southern writer of another century (no, not my century), could compete with a couple of cute kittens.

Then Stephanie, the REAL EDITOR, took me by the hand, figuratively, and found a decent photograph of me, and set up a “Follower” attachment. I do not understand much about this, but I have slowly built up a small list of groupies, and I appreciate it. I intend to take her and the rest of the staff at the “Times” to lunch at Madison’s one day. Maybe not Sid, though. We can bring back some takeout for him.

Soon I was being recognized throughout the county. The first “biggie” was my piece “I’m Not Obese, I am Just Big-Boned”. I basked in the glory of it all. I took my own advice and I lost weight, and got faster on the walking trails. And, as an aside to that, my son and my grandson visited me this last weekend and programmed my I-Pod, which I had been using for a bookmark because I could not turn it on, and today I walked with it hanging from my ears. It was tuned to the Beach Boys and I paced myself and I actually did a mile in 15 minutes! I now have no doubt that I will reach the eight minute mile level, IF I live to be eighty five!

But back to being recognized. Along with recognition here in Jackson County came the “Why don’t you write one about…..” Fill in the blanks: religion; politics; religion and politics; sex; sex, religion and politics. You get the idea. Up until now I would merely nod my head after listening to the question, thank them and walk off.

You will note that I said: “up till now”.

A few days ago I was having breakfast with a very attractive lady and she said: “Why don’t you write a column about Daylight Savings Time?” We had agreed in our conversation that this idea, foisted off on us a couple of times a year, was an abomination. My internal wake up alarm is out of kilter because of it and my breakfast companion has to do her running on a different route since her usual one is not lit by the city. Because I enjoy our breakfasts together, I figured that I had better take this topic on.

It is always necessary to do research unless you have become the authority on a subject or have outlived enough people that knew more about it than you do. Fortunately I recall a great deal about why Daylight Savings Time was thrust upon the United States of America during World War II by Congress. President Franklin D. Roosevelt had pushed through a Declaration of War on December 8, 1941 against Japan and Germany and maybe Italy. (I believe that there was some dispute over who would have Italy. We had them in the first World War, and Churchill felt it was only fair that Germany should have to put up with them this time). The congressmen were peeved that they did not think of this first, so they decided to do something, and came up with Daylight Savings Time. It was meant to give the farmers another hour of sunlight, but this didn’t work, so they decided that it would give war plant workers another hour of day time, but the buildings where those folks built planes and tanks were well lighted, so it didn’t really matter to them. Since Congress works something like the town council of a small municipality, the law has hung in like a cocklebur, and has lasted through WWII, Korea, Vietnam and, for me, the Battle of Oceanview, Virginia. It will probably be with us as we move toward intergalactic space wars between universes and run head on into the Klingons.



So it is obvious that no one should mess with time. I have written several articles about time. Once I used the idea “Make use of scraps of time”. No one will ever know how glad I am that I did not find that motto while my wife Theresa was living. She would have waved it in front of my nose every day, along with her “work” list. She has been gone a little over four years and I am only half through the tasks she had given me.

Time is neither constant nor sure. It is elastic. Read this carefully and I believe you will agree. I get a call to come over to Marianna for breakfast, a distance of sixteen miles. If I am on time, I can drive within the speed limit and make the run in 18 minutes. If I am late, I can drive seventy five miles an hour and my Explorer will ease into a parking space in front of the Gazebo twenty five minutes after I left Sneads. Explain that, Mr. Congressman! We both know that U. S. 90 does not stretch nor contract that much, so it must be time that is so flexible.

When my companion and I sit down to eat, we talk and sometimes we spend two hours together, but it only seems like ten minutes to me. Then the next Sunday I go to church, and the preacher speaks for fifteen minutes, and I catch myself not only looking at my watch often, but wishing I had a calendar.

You have to realize now that it is Congress’ fault. I have not narrowed it down to either House, but I suspect that it is the fault of our Representatives, since they are all running for re-election this year.

The Florida House has it right. They only mess with time as it concerns them. There is a requirement that the body adjourn sine die. This means “within the day” and for years the sergeant-at-arms would, at a nod from the presiding officer, manually stop the movement of hands on the official clock until important business was transacted. The House did this for something over a hundred years, until they figured that unfinished business would mean a special session with more expense money and possibly lots of flowers and strong drink from the lobbyists. I personally liked the old way better. At least they did not push sine die off on the farmers.

I hope that you have learned something about time from my writings. Consider this: Horus was an Egyptian god who was signified by both a circle and by time. Our Congress has angered Horus by inflicting Daylight Savings Time on our country. This is the real reason that the health care bill passed. Do not anger the gods.

And remember what H. L. Mencken said: “For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat and wrong”.