Approx. 450 words; 2.5 minutes read time
It must be some kind of vintage movie time machine.
Small confession: I am one of those guys who has a working VCR. While I certainly stream my share of films these days, I enjoy the tangible aspects of VHS video. I’m slowly growing my collection of classic sci-fi, action-adventure, and horror on VHS and watch something on tape at least once a week. Anyway, I was a bit surprised when this last Sunday morning I discovered my VCR’s clock had mysteriously changed. It was precisely one hour ahead.
My first thought: it advanced the time for Daylight Saving Time (DST) on this Sunday by mistake. Maybe I had the date entered wrong. The thing was, I set the time and date back on March 8th for Daylight Savings and had also toggled the DST option to “on.” It shouldn’t have changed time again until the fall.
Although certain I had set everything up properly, I opened up the Date and Time menu to double-check. Sure enough, all was correct. That’s when it dawned on me. The “problem” was not my VCR at all. Instead, the world around it had changed.
A quick Google search confirmed it – The Energy Policy Act of 2005 extended Daylight Saving Time in the United States by several weeks. My VCR was made in 2002.
The “DST Act” went into effect in 2007 and moved the start date for DST from the first Sunday of April to the second Sunday of March. The end was changed too, moved from the last Sunday of October to the first Sunday in November. My VCR from 2002 predated the act and changed the time according to the old dates for DST. For 2020, that would have been this last Sunday, April 3rd.
My VCR was working as it should.
Maybe you remember this federal act going into effect back in ‘07, now thirteen years ago. I have to admit that I had forgotten all about it. That is until my VCR decided to act like some kind of vintage movie time machine. I do recall now all the hubbub back then, but only vaguely. In reality, the change just became a part of my life, like so many other things.
That’s all this post is. Initially, I thought I’d draw some parallels with our current situation, maybe bring in a few time travel references and try and pull together some prophetic statements on change.
But it’s just a VCR with outdated programming. I’m thankful it works and happy to have the simple joy it brings to my life.
I hope you are finding time for simple joys as well.
Until next time, Science. Fiction. Create.
JRC