Daylight saving time ends Sunday in Philly, and here’s to the bright sides

Upon leaving work Monday you might wonder who turned out the lights, and feel a decided disorientation. Relax. You’ve come down with a classic case of normality, assures Philadelphia therapist Tonya Ladipo.

The clocks go back one hour at 1:59:59 a.m. Sunday, and with the return of standard time, our bodies undergo a dramatic reset that transcends just adjusting to earlier sunsets and creeping darkness. “It feels like you’re shifting your whole schedule because you’re doing things at times that perhaps your body doesn’t want to,” says Ladipo. Sound familiar?

Her prescription: Focus on the bright sides.

It’s not as though we’ve lost any light. In fact, we have just gained an opportunity to mine more of what those who study these things say is the most therapeutic light of the day, courtesy of the early-morning sun — not to mention a precious weekend hour.

Sunday is indeed a new day, with a cuticle of an almost-new moon visible in the daytime sky. You may even get to savor some “earthshine,” sunlight from Earth that lightens the dark portion of the moon, and cast those mythically outsized early- and late-day shadows. The sun works some of its best magic this time of year when it’s low in the sky.

Here are some reasons to believe that after regaining an hour, things are looking up.

The moon isn’t necessarily known for its subtlety, but it will be showing its subdued side the next few days when a curved sliver of it will be visible throughout the day and after sunset.

Chances are that at twilight you can catch a translucent glow on the unlighted portion of the moon. That would be light reflected from Earth, as EarthSky explains, a phenomenon known as “earthshine.”

It’s fitting that the moon would give back to us, since it owes its life to us. As Villanova University astrophysicist Edward Sion observed, the moon evidently was formed from a chunk of Earth launched into space when our planet got whacked by an object the size of Mars. Moon rocks support that hypothesis, NASA says.

Nothing is subtle about a supermoon, and we will be getting the fourth one in four months on Nov. 15, when our satellite makes one of its closest approaches of the year and reaches the instant of fullness. This will be the last one of 2024, and a special one. Not only will the moon appear about 30% brighter than it does when it’s farther from Earth, but it will be rising around 4:20 p.m. and reach peak brightness while most people are still awake, conspiring with bare trees to create intricate shadows.

The moon will rise even earlier on the 14th, 3:45 p.m., when it will be about 97% full, and just after 5 p.m. on the 16th, still 99% full.

Since they ride an astronomical seesaw, the full moons beam longer and higher as the sun’s days grow shorter.

One reason so many people missed October’s dramatic aurora appearance over Philly was that the show was so brief. But an encore isn’t out of the question, say space weather experts. The longer nights increase the chances that they would be visible. NASA has announced that we are in the “maximum period” of the 11-year solar cycle during which “sunspot” activity is at a peak. Sunspots are solar storms that can eject mass amounts of material toward Earth that ignite the northern lights.

The peak could last into the summer of 2026, said Rob Steenburgh, a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center. “In any case,” he said, “I’d anticipate plenty of opportunities for aurora sightings in the coming months.”

Save for the dryness, it’s hard to complain about an October that featured all of two cloudy days, and it appears that the sun will continue to reign during the first week of November with pleasant temperatures.

Conditions this week should be ideal for admiring the foliage, which is just now peaking in parts of the region, and its remnants, and don’t miss the treetops during and just after sunset.

In the academic literature you’ll find all sorts of perspectives on Vitamin D, but everyone agrees that we need it, and the sun remains the best natural source. Experts in seasonal affective disorder and its lesser variant, “winter blues,” which result from the light loss this time of year, recommend getting outside early and often, and the earlier sunrises mean more opportunities to do just that. Phyllis C. Zee, neurology professor at the Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine, says that early morning light is the sun’s best stuff of the day because it shines in a “different spectrum” and is “more alerting.”

No matter what, said Ladipo, whose office is in Manayunk, make it a point to get out there at some point: The sun is a source of serotonin, the so-called feel-good hormone. She says she gets out 20 to 30 minutes a day, rain, shine, snow, or wintry mix, even if her body resists.

“Halfway through I feel grouchy and grumpy,” she said. But after feeling the light, “I’m glad I did this.”

For those who have had it with these time changes, we would advise getting used to them. State legislatures have considered 700 bills that would ditch the switch and go with year-round Daylight Saving Time should Congress ever grant its approval, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

That’s certainly not going to happen soon; something about an election.

Pennsylvania has two such bills pending, and Michigan has one. Year-round daylight save time probably wouldn’t be real popular in the town of Houghton, in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where the sun rose Saturday at 8:39 a.m. It’s on the western border of the Eastern Time Zone. With all daylight saving, all the time, on Christmas morning, it would rise at 9:39 a.m.