Did that heading grab your attention?
Lockdown started late March in Scotland and from April I started getting up at 6.30, about an hour earlier than usual, so that I could go for a cycle and hopefully not meet many people. Enjoyed that, so from May started getting up at about 5.15. This whilst maintaining normal bedtime of 11.0.
So I decided to do some projections on this extra time that I was awake. Assuming I go back to only an hour earlier each day when the clocks change for the winter I will have been awake for about 22 days more than usual by the end of this year.
When I hit 70 I gave myself a goal of really working on maintaining a high level of fitness with the thought that this would be vital in allowing me to get the most out of each and every day. And fingers crossed to at least 90!
Say if that worked out it would give me an extra 14/15 months.
Colin Hay has some fine lyrics in his song “I’m going to get you stoned” in relation to the passing of time and Gandhi’s “Live as if you were going to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were going to live forever” has always been a favourite of mine. Coincidentally, he was assassinated the year I was born.
It’s been strange that being awake for a lot longer each day hasn’t necessitated a siesta or grabbing an occasional 40 winks. I reckon it’s probably linked to age related hormonal changes.
And finally, while putting this together I discovered, much to my surprise having always thought it was a 50/50 split that the clocks go back in winter for only 5 months.
Not many people know that I reckon, Michael.
Mahatma would have been proud of me. And Mahatma is not a wee Scots boy asking his mother for his hat but rather a nickname meaning “ great soul”