Late Nights

It is a universal truth that children really, really want to stay up past their bedtime. The BFF's boys have a longstanding 8 pm bedtime, and they will try any half-assed reason to stay up. The same excuses they have trotted out for oh, six to eight years. Sporting events are a guaranteed tussle, with promises about brushing their teeth during the commercials if they can please, please, please watch one more inning. Tonight, it was all about the Charlie Brown Halloween Special. Which was a clear no-go, because it started at 8:00 and lasted a full hour.

Truth be told, my heart goes out to them with every round of begging. I haven't told them yet that one of the best things about being a grown-up is you get to decide when you go to bed. And you can put yourself to bed, but still keep the light on while you read, or do the crossword puzzle, or eat bon-bons. I figure there's no use in sharing that information now, because there will be many more years of bedtime tussles and then a whole lot of curfew debates. Why tell them about something that they won't get to enjoy for another eight years?

The local niecelet, on the other hand, has become quite the night owl. She's been known to call me after 10 pm on a school night, which I judge as rather permissive. Sometimes she stays up and reads, but I suspect she's mostly on her laptop or listening to her iPod, and on those nights she's probably up until midnight. I think she is one of those cases that was born a late night lover, and the pre-adolescent changes in chemistry have just unleashed a characteristic she came in with. I speak with some authority on this matter, as a longtime late night lover myself. I don't know why everything seems so much better or more interesting when it takes place at night. And I don't necessarily mean late night parties or special events -- I mean Charlie Rose and his guests, or the latest issue of the New Yorker, or the way a book really gets to me after 1 AM. For years, (okay in my 20's) when I sporadically kept a journal, I wouldn't start writing before 10:30. And now that there are DVD's with multiple episodes on them, I usually finish watching between 1:30 and 2. (Tonight was Disk 1, Season 6, Part 2 of the Sopranos, but I was done by 11. Only two episodes.)

All of this is by way of explaining why this Sunday is my favorite day of the year. The day when the clock falls back an hour, and you get an extra hour of sleep or gardening or reading or whatever you want to do. The BFF makes fun of me every year by telling me that the whole daylight savings thing is make-believe, but I don't care. I like gaining an hour every fall and hate losing it in the spring.

Last year at this time, I had a great late night routine that revolved around a radio show called Open Source. It's the only good thing that's come out of Boston in a long, long time, according to my rigorous standards. It was broadcast on KQED-FM at 1 AM, so I could read for awhile and then tune in, or listen to News and Notes which came on at midnight. Open Source was (and still is) a fantastic show that focuses on one topic for the whole hour, and always has intelligent, eclectic and savvy guests. Their funding looked secure in the late spring when they received a grant from the MacArthur Foundation. But in one of those moves that shows just how tenuous producing any intellectual or artistic project is, another one of their funders dropped out and they went "on hiatus" in July. Still, you must, must, must check out their website and see what they've been programming. They really are a treasure, and challenge you to think, a quality that's all too rare in many of today's "news" sources. And they have podcasts -- sample the one with Edwidge Danticat, and you'll see why I'm raving...

Off to bed now, but not to sleep. I have a very good shot at completing the NY Times crossword puzzle since it's only Tuesday!