The Days Are Shorter: Don’t Fall into the Seasonal Blahs

By: Edward M. Eveld
Posted In: News

Our beautiful autumn- our crisp afternoons and pleasing zephyrs, floating leaves of gold and crimson- has turned dark.

Really dark.

We make our way home from work like moles, like miners with headlamps or cave dwellers bearing torches.

We have gone from saving daylight to chucking it, and our psyches and bodies naturally react. Or react naturally. We feel robbed of that after-work time to get things done outdoors. Even more, as the days shrink, we feel the change biologically.

We want to sleep more, eat more. The blahs come quicker.

Whose idea was this?

“I depend on the light,” said Craig Lueck, a master illustrator at Hallmark. “I do like longer days. My absolute favorite times are catching the light on the way to work and the way back. Typically I have the digital camera going.” (He promises he’s not looking through the viewfinder with the car moving.)

Changing the clock, of course, didn’t reduce the amount of daylight in 24 hours. Nature takes care of that.

By Dec. 21, the winter solstice, daylight will have shrunk to 9 hours and 27 minutes, with sunset at 4:59 p.m.

The change in sunlight patterns can play havoc with our internal clocks and daily schedules, doctors say. Feeling glum as daylight decreases and when cloudy weather persists is normal, even if it’s no fun.

One answer is to change your attitude about dark days. Joe Cecil, director of the Writers Place in Kansas City, considers the dark a fine setting for the task of writing.

“Light isn’t spewing over the planet,” he said. “I think it’s a great time for reflection.”

He admits, though, that he likes morning darkness more than the late-afternoon variety.

“I would prefer to have li