While I understand that there may be some sort of a need for it, changing the clock is not something I can look forward to doing. Not only do I not look forward to it, I really don’t like it at all. Working a daytime job leaves little time for me to pursue my other interests and hobbies through the week as it is, but when the time changes, it gets even worse.

I have to lose an additional hour of daylight in the evenings, when I need it the most, and gain it in the mornings, when I need it the least. Working inside the office, it really doesn’t matter to me if it is light or not. However, trying to work outside — painting, carpentry work, cutting firewood or any of the other things I like to do — in the dark is almost impossible.

So, that leaves me with only a few hours each Saturday to focus on, the prospects for which are often not as good as they should be.

Having the pressure of only one day to work gives me the willies when I start thinking about all the things I want to do and the few things I actually have time to do.

With most of my fishing aspirations passing by with each day of fall, I turn instead to my other hobby, hunting.

The season for bow and arrows is upon us and the gun-hunting time is fast approaching. I always try to get at least one deer in the freezer each year, as a matter of tradition if not necessity. There have been more than a few times in my life when I was tickled to death to see a deer stew or roast, but these days I eat it because I enjoy it more than because of serious financial need.

One good thing is the fact that the deer population is as high right now as it ever has been in my life. My father tells me that deer were fairly scarce when he was growing up and shooting one was a rare occurrence.

In the 1930s, most of the people in these mountains depended on wild game to supplement their diets. Of course, the old way of life, with subsistence farming, canning up enough food for winter and hunting and fishing to fill in the gaps, is all but gone.

There are still a few people around who still kill a hog, a few chickens or a yearling bull for their own use, but most folks just go down to the supermarket to pick up their choice of meats. And vegetables? You can find stuff grown all over the planet at a nearby grocery or super store. Who ever heard of bok choy in the 1930s? I bet a lot of people here had never even seen bananas back then. Maybe a few oranges for Christmas found their way to the stocking, if the family was lucky.

If things don’t change soon, there may be a lot of families depending on a return to the old ways of life to make it. I wouldn’t be surprised if canning, hunting and fishing aren’t already on the increase as folks try to get by in tough times.

I can say that raising my own food has been a rewarding, if not cost effective, thing for me to do these last few years. I enjoy raising small livestock and especially gardening.

However, if I had to depend on what I raised this year to stay alive, I can safely say that I might have starved to death. With all the rain we had, most of my plants drowned and the rest just didn’t do very well. I think I ended up with two or three heads of cabbage and two ears of corn. The only thing I had any quantity of was sunflower seeds. It’s a hard way to make a meal if that’s all that’s hitting the plate — unless of course you are a bird.

I guess I should just count myself blessed to be employed with the way things are going for a lot of folks around here. I recently heard that unemployment for the greater Galax, Va. area is around 20 percent. That means that about one out of five people of working age is without a paycheck every Friday. Of course, we all know about the situation here in Alleghany, which isn’t a whole lot better than that, even though the numbers say only 10 percent are unemployed. I don’t see things getting a whole lot better around these parts.

At least we live in the country where we can choose our way of life. I’d much rather be here out of work than in a city where you can’t hunt or fish and the only thing that seems to grow is another strip mall on the edge of town. I guess it looks different depending on where you’re coming from.

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