The Sunday Effect

I want you to think back REAL hard to the days when you were in middle or elementary school. There? Good. Remember how Sundays felt? After having a great weekend with no work, visits to friends, sleeping in, and all the lazing around you could manage, Sunday night came and as the sun sank in the sky, an empty pit welled up in your stomach. Back to school tomorrow? Already? It was like you wanted to slow the clocks so Monday would never come.

I hated that feeling. It was the same feeling I got at the end of August when I knew school was about to start. I'd sit out on the driveway, watching the purple clouds swirling in the sky, and I'd wish that I could spend my whole life outside playing instead of cooped up in a classroom. Even in college it was bad. A lot of people I knew couldn't wait to get back to school. Not me. I loved being around my family and having reunions with my high school friends. Also at home there was no pressure to present yourself well every day, no stress of "is there something going on this weekend?" or "am I going to trip and send my lunch flying everywhere in the dining hall?"

And even now... I'm completely out of school, yet I still get that feeling around this time of year. The air starts to get a little crisper. The mornings and nights are colder. You start to see your own breath hang in the air. The sun goes down earlier and earlier... days get shorter. And though there's no "back to school" to worry about, there's still a sense that change is coming. It might just be the season, or it might be something else, something you're not expecting.

I wonder how long it'll be before the Sunday Effect goes away. Maybe never?