Monday, September 24, 2012

It's September; Do You Know Where Your Children Are?



As a society, we trust order, but are not above manipulating our world to match our expectations of what the world ought to be.  We proved that time was not immutable by inventing "daylight savings time.”  By the written order of Congress, the laws of heaven and earth were overcome.  It should require no more than a voice vote and the twitch of a scrivener’s pen, then, to realign the entire calendar to conform with the well-established pattern of our lives.  That this has not yet happened must be a matter of mere oversight.  After all, is there any month of the year more deserving of "New Year" status than September?

Anyone who has children, who has had children, who knows children, or was a child knows instinctively that the new year, in all its many aspects, does not commence in January, but rather in September.  School, sports, marketing of holiday displays at Costco – they all begin in September.  The only beginning January heralds is the long, dull stretch of winter that does not include any festive holidays.  

Even calendar makers recognize the folly of arbitrarily granting January the "new beginning" status it does not deserve.  An increasingly large proportion of calendars found at those ever-popular kiosks in the mall are of the 16-month variety, tacitly acknowledging September's status as the true beginning of the new year.

We live our lives according to this adjustment to the actuarial orthodoxy.  This month, like every September of the past decade, has devolved into a flurry of activity, full schedules, neglected lawns and exhaustion.  We have seen the beginning of the sophomore year in high school and fifth grade, with increased workloads for both, the beginning of the soccer and fall baseball seasons, dust on the trumpet transferred to the videogame machines, and the Giants making another run at the playoffs.
There have been many notable events and pictures to share over the last several weeks.  I've simply been too busy or too lazy tired to share them.  

Yet.  Stay tuned.

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