Who thought this thing up anyway? Spring forward, fall back. Or is that fall forward, spring back? The only way we can ever be sure is if we’re early or late for church Sunday morning, or whatever it is you do on Sunday morning.

To be fair, there’s usually someone around smart enough to know the difference, if it isn’t you yourself.

But back to the main question at hand, who did think this up?

Popular belief has it that it’s all about farming and the agrarian lifestyle that dominated western societies for the past few hundred years. Digging a little deeper, it turns out that the whole thing was invented by a gentleman from New Zealand named George Vernon Hudson, an entomologist (bug lover) who highly valued his daylight time and detested those who slept away those precious sun filled hours of summer. Long story short, he got the ball rolling, and some hundred or so years later we’re still locked into that bug-loving cycle of spring forward (or backward) and back again. Year after year.

There is a lot to be said for getting that extra hour of sunshine going when spring finally … springs.

But how much fun is it when the reverse is the case and we suddenly end up plunged into darkness by late afternoon? Some people become seriously depressed during the shorter days of winter. Others aren’t bothered by it at all, the ones who shun the sunshine.

It’s all above the average person’s pay grade to know just what to make of it, and why we keep at it year after year.

After all, it’s just what we do, isn’t it?