Opinion: Another Dumb Attempt To Eliminate Daylight Saving Time

As I begin to type this, I'm asking myself why. Why am I so passionately opposed to this idea, of eliminating Daylight Saving Time? It's not a matter of not dealing well with change. I think what it is, is it's one of the first things about Michigan that I fell in love with, after I moved here 1987.

When you grow up on the eastern side of a time zone, in my case, the Central time zone, dark gets there first in the afternoon or evening, as the case may be. Then in '87, as we got into late Spring, I was running an errand after work, to J.C. Penny at the Crossroads. The sun is shining bright and I get to the entry door and it's closed. Huh? I looked at my watch. (Yes, that's how old this story is.) It showed 9:05 PM. And the store closed at 9pm. (9 pm, sharp! apparently)

That to me may be the best thing about living here - daylight til well past 10 around the Summer Solstice. It was the answer to the one thing we hated as kids. Playing outside with your friends and it getting dark, and having to go inside. In this part of Michigan, you got an extra hour to play.

And now this politician, from Manton, Michigan Rep. Michele Hoitenga, wants to eliminate it. She's from Manton. Of course, daylight doesn't matter in Manton. All the locals do is sit and watch the cars fly through on the way to Traverse City from 131. But, if she were a good politician, she might realize that Traverse City is a tourist mecca, and daylight hours in the summer are a good thing. But then, deer damage to a vehicle is good for the body shop industry.

The saving grace to this is that any change to Daylight Savings Tim would be contingent on all the state's surrounding us doing the same thing. The bad news is, there are dumb politicians everywhere.

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