Dawn's Early Light

Most of the United States fell back Sunday morning, moving the clock back from 2am to 1am.  Actually, most of us probably did that sooner - like before heading to bed or even during the day.

Just this year, for the first time in many years, I did not make that clock adjustment after waking up in the morning.

I don't think it was a "prank," so much as something that became a challenge to see how long it would take before the rest of the family would notice.

Light, or the morning return of it, even temporarily, is one of the nice things about the end of daylight savings time.  Saturday morning and for most of the past month around southern Wisconsin and our latitude and north, we wouldn't see even the hint of dawn until 7.  I recall living and working in Indianapolis, it would be later than that - closer to 8am given their location at the west edge of the Eastern Time Zone.

Yes, it is nice having some daylight nudge you up in the morning. The pink hues and gentle light playing on patches of fog are a gentle start to the day.

The trade-off is sunset is now before 5pm... and the hours of light will continue to shrink right up to December 21 when we start squeezing a little more light into each day.

It's part of the transition to winter - the loss of light, the end of the year, the reminder of the seasons in our own lives - and a great reminder to enjoy the days we had and have together and the sun that lights up our lives.