Henry's Asylum

Time for a Change

Whatever happened to days that were defined by the activities that absorbed one’s time? I was contemplating that thought just the other day when my daughter (she’s ten) couldn’t quite figure out what day of the week it was. For a moment, I was appalled. This has happened more than once and I feel that part of the reason is cable\satellite TV (cartoons on demand). Not to mention misplaced school “holidays”. On the week of March 14th, I stumbled out of my usual early afternoon coma, which is induced by the unusual hours I’m currently working (2:00 PM – 12:30 AM, Monday thru Saturday – at least until we complete a backlog of printers that had quickly piled up as the result of selectively inept management decisions. There’s nothing like the painful incompetence that emanates from “Leadership”). I was wondering why she wasn’t in school and got the usual “dad is so out of touch with the real world” looks from both wife and daughter. “It’s Spring Break” was the impatient reply. Of course, I foolishly shot back “I thought it was still winter”. Ah yes, dad is so ignorant, sometimes. I looked at my wife and said “Instead of ‘Spring Break’, why doesn’t the school system just call it what it is, namely ‘The Teachers Don’t Feel like Working This Week – So There, Break.’” How nice.
When I was a kid, time was more orderly and defined. Monday was the start of the school week (a precursor to “Oh no, it’s a Monday” feeling one gets at the start of a work week). After all, wasn’t school the “work week” of a kid? This sense of time made it’s way through the next few days until, at last, Friday afternoon. Then it was Friday evening cartoons, which, unlike the after school cartoons Monday thru Friday, were geared more towards current times and seemed more sophisticated (“Johnny Quest” vs “Looney Tunes”). But that was mostly because I was staying up late on Friday night. Plus, I never really understood all the adult references in the old Bugs Bunny type toons, circa World War 2 that floated along the network channels in the just-after-school hours. Saturdays were magic and will never be re-lived. Sundays were all church, visiting Grandma, playing outside with my "Sunday Grandma’s neighborhood friends" and special Sunday dinners. Each holiday had it’s soul piercing unique flavor. Summers beckoned until silenced by Christmas but stayed forever once they had arrived. The world slowly went to sleep in Fall but smiled briefly on Halloween.
Now, time seems to move only forward. Ever forward. I need to find that old, forgotten way that I possessed as a child – to make time stop and start in tune with the days of the week and the lost, melting seasons of the year.

posted by hbrennan @ 9:59 PM