Behind in Time

Have I mentioned that I hate Time Difference? How about that I loathe and detest it?

Well if not (which I highly doubt), I do.

Yesterday, an important day in our family, I was planning on phoning my mum. I was in my mind while I sat at my desk that as soon as I was no longer at my desk, I'd call her.

But then I forgot - it slipped out of reach as I drove home, further still when I decided that stopping at Walmart for CD players, baby wipes and disinfectant (for work... my job is not the most conventional) was a good idea. And by the time I got home it was too late.

But I called anyway.

And woke my Mommy up.

Oops.

I told her to go back to sleep - that I'd phone her today, and that I love her. I put the phone down and paused to let the nose tingle (does everyone's nose tingle when they're about to cry?) and throat ache (how about throat ache?) to die down. I blinked a few times and went to get dinner started. It's not like it hasn't happened before.

Living on this side of the Atlantic, behind rather than ahead in Time, you (I) hold the calling power. Phone calls are made in the evening and my evening is later than their evening, so it's up to me to call them in theirs - to find the time in my day when their day has already ended.

When I was ahead in Time, I used to find this all very frustrating. I'd be ready for bed, aching for sleep, and it would only be 5pm in Jeremy's world. I'd either have to stay awake until gone midnight to talk to him or else I'd snatch a few words while he was at work - conscious that I was sharing him with math code and work phones and evening plans. Generally I stayed awake until after midnight. Generally I was exhausted. I resented him for my lack of sleep - surely it's easy enough to find time in the day, or immediately after work...

Now I'm behind in Time I understand. You mean to call and want to call but then something else comes up and it's still daylight outside so how could it possibly be night somewhere else. And then you check the time and realise it's let you down - that to phone now would mean waking them, stealing precious rest from them, and another day has passed.

And that is why I hate, loathe, detest Time Difference. And why without it the Atlantic would be that much smaller.