Let?s keep Daylight Saving Time all year

I hate the time of year when we ?fall back? to regular time seeing it?s dark by the time most people get off work.

Did you ever notice there?s a lot more depression and anxiety this time of year? Ever wonder why? My guess is that it?s despair caused by the fact we end up working the daylight away to emerge in darkness, giving us the sensation that we just work and sleep all the time.

There?s no time to soak in a little of the sun once Daylight Saving Time ends in October. As I?ve said many times before, I wish we?d stay on Daylight Saving Time year round since the only benefit I see by ?falling back? is an extra hour sleep the day after we set our clocks back. That?s a big price to pay for having no daylight enjoyment until spring.

And, just think, the days will continue to get shorter until Dec. 22. It?s like living in Alaska during the winter, hardly any sunlight. But, we?re stuck with regular time until we return to DST on March 11 next year.

Given my griping about this whole time change mess, I decided to look up what brought about this whole thing. Believe it or not, the man who invented almost everything else was the one who came up with Daylight Saving Time. Yes, Benjamin Franklin, in his 1784 essay ?An Economical Project? first touted the idea of a savings time. However, it was not put into effect until 1918 at the end of World War I, but was repealed the following year.

Remember, Daylight Saving Time is our friend. It?s the time we just left when we fell back an hour. With that in mind, it was President Franklin D. Roosevelt who enacted ?War Time? from 1942-1945 where we stayed on Daylight Saving Time year-round. Now that was the right idea. Why didn?t we keep it?

The time schedule we are now stuck with was introduced, in somewhat of its present form, by President Lyndon Johnson in 1966, though it has been modified a bit over the years. The modification continues this next year when savings time will continue a bit later than normal, with the falling back not occurring until the first Sunday in November. While I appreciate the extra few days of light, it could cause lots of problems with computer clocks and other schedules.

Personally, I say we go back to Roosevelt?s War Time and stay on Daylight Saving Time around the clock. Contrary to most old wive?s tales out there, neither Daylight Saving Time or Standard Time have anything to do with farmers or agriculture. Instead, the hours are adjusted to try to maximize daylight time for economic purposes. Of course, in doing this they did not take into account the natural human need for sunshine and daylight even on days where the mercury dips way down.

Along with the natural need for light, I think staying with Daylight Saving Time is a safety issue. Soon, rush hour will be happening in darkness, making commuting much more dangerous. By keeping DST, we would keep sunset past 5 p.m. daily, thereby allowing for the commute home in daylight while only the really early commuters would have to deal with the offshoot of a later sunrise.

And another big plus is that we might even cut crime seeing daylight would extend deeper into the evening hours as opposed to sundown coming just after 4 p.m. at one point. It?s a proven fact most thieves work in the evening hours, not the early morning, pre-dawn hours. Yes, thieves like their sleep just like we do.

However, this whole thing is just spitting into the wind. Things won?t change. We?re probably stuck with this whole time mess for good. And now, even the longtime hold out Indiana, which for many decades refused to join the time-shift madness, has said it will recognize the time change this year.

Duane Sherrill is a reporter for the Standard who can be reached at 473-2191.