Does anybody REALLY know what time it is?...................

(Song line from the group Chicago. Did you get it?)

Living in a state that Spings ahead and Falls back, everybody's body clock has been in turmoil this week. The news reporters like to play heavily on the fact that we get an extra hour of sleep, but I would like to know just who it is that really gets that extra hour? My internal clock woke me up at the regular time on Sunday morning. I guess my I forgot to teach my inner child how to tell time.

When I came back from my Sunday run, the first thing I noted was that OPs were still eating lunch. Just as I was about to scold (my) Mister for not feeding them "on time" I glanced at the clock and saw that it was just ten minutes after twelve. It just felt like it was an hour later, because it really was, or was it? To really be able to tell that, one would have to go back to when the first clock was invented and trace every second forward to this very one to find out the "real" time. Way more than I care to do. It is much easier to simply go along with the current system, slowly acclimating my body to the time change over the next two weeks.

The bigger question I think we should be asking ourselves is why someone decided we had to try and harness time in the first place. So many stresses have come out of the concept of time. Think about the lucky cavewoman. No stress or pressure. She got up and focussed on surviving during daylight hours (and probably much later once fire was invented and she could work by firelight... You know how moms are!) and layed down to re-charge her body batteries when the sun disappeared.

Then somebody decided that the sun, moon, and seasons was not efficient enough, so they started organizing the days into chunks of time. Now we eat, sleep, work, and play according to the hands on the clock instead of what our bodies instintcually know is good for us. This (insane) clock watching is directly responsible for a multitude of stresses. Who hasn't had to deal with crabbiness when trying to get your family out the door "on time?" Who hasn't gone through a "pink" traffic light or two for the sake of getting to work or a scheduled appointment? And then, for those of us that have developed into over-achievers, there is an un-written rule that if we are not five minutes early we are late. Figure that one out?

As I stated earlier, it is easier to go along with the concept of time and clock watching. There is one area though that I would encourage you to break every time constraint rule that you can. That is in the area of loving. Practice loving every single second of every single day. Love as you are rushing around bowing to the almighty keeper of the time. Love when the guy in front of you decided to stop on yellow and there is no way you are going to get punched in to work on time. Love when you are ready to rush out the door in the nick of time and one of the group has to go to the bathroom even though they were just in there (I say this in my defense, because it is usually me, and I TOTALLY blame it on the fact that my mother must have insisted that I do this as a child. I also HAVE to do this right before going to bed for the night. Maybe some training CAN be too ingrained?). Love when you are on time (you know, five minutes early) for the meeting, and have to sit around while the rest of the group trickles in (This one can be made easier to accomplish if you remember to keep a knitting project or a book with you at all times). Treat yourself with loving kindness when you ruin that time-consuming, expensive ingredience, double batch of cookies, by forgetting to set the timer and burning half of them (again, I speak from experience).

Simply put, love all the time. It will greatly aid you in combating the stress of the clock, as well as set a wonderful tone for all the activities one must attend to in a day. And on that loving note, it is time to start my day!