THREE MINUTES A DAY


In wintertime I am sad, so SAD. My life is complicated by SAD – Seasonal Affective Disorder – where the lack of daylight pushes me inward towards hibernation. The lack of daylight conspires with the lack of sunlight to increase depressive tendencies. So I’m at the mercy of both the rotation of the earth, and the weather.

The rotation of the earth is totally reliable and predictable; the weather is capricious and fickle. However, once the winter solstice occurs around December twenty-first, there begins a slow creeping towards spring, and hope begins to bloom in my heart.

According to the weatherman, we get three more minutes of daylight every day no matter what the weather. Not much to begin with, but it adds up. Three more minutes of daylight every day means over twenty minutes a week that becomes an hour and a half per month. So eight hours of thin dreary daylight in early January turns into a full-bodied extravaganza of DAYLIGHT for over sixteen hours daily by the summer solstice around June twenty-first.

I comfort myself with those three minutes through January and February. I also appreciate every scrap of anemic sunshine over the winter months; the sun comes out and I scream, “YES!” If I’m driving, I pump my fist, yes; otherwise I do a little sun dance. If the sun stays out long enough for me to bask, I bask blissfully.

I usually don’t really begin to feel better until near the spring equinox in mid-March when I stop counting the minutes. By April, sunshine and daylight pull me from bed earlier and earlier each day. I have more energy. Suddenly, I’m an optimist.

But in January I count the minutes like pennies in a piggybank. One of the ways I have dealt with SAD in past winters is to go to Guatemala for two or three months where sunshine and good friends who play Scrabble help to pass the time. When I must stay here I do have a lamp that simulates daylight; I increase my vitamin intake; I see my therapist more frequently. All these things help, but I never stop pining away for true spring.

Some winter days seem interminable, but, paradoxically, I never have enough time to do everything I want. On the other hand, the weeks and months and even seasons often seem to speed by. All except for winter with its three-minutes, three-minutes, three minutes of daylight rationing. Hang on! Here comes another three! Can spring be far behind?