I just don’t like 4:00. I have had this feeling for all of my life, but I just have never felt deeply enough to share until this moment. It is in fact, 4:09 when I am writing this, but I have never felt more disdain for this hour of the day until this year. It just is frustrating because I feel like it is too late to be the afternoon, but it is too early to be the evening. I think the part that is the worst for me is that I am hungry at 4:00, but I feel like it is too early to eat dinner, but a big snack will spoil my dinner. I also feel ready to start winding down for the day, maybe have a glass of wine, but that is reserved for 5:00. Perhaps 4:00 is just the Thursday of hours?
Any motivation I have had in life is just out the window at 4:00. Maybe I have just trained my body to not like 4:00 because of how I grew up with this hour. I would get out of school and be tired from the day and take a break then. It usually looked like a hardy snack of apples and peanut butter and on some days maybe even chicken nuggets. I would turn on my favorite reality television or catch up on the most recent episode of “Glee” or open up a fun read and just plop until it was time for dinner.
My parents hated it. They would tell me to get up and do my homework so that I could relax after dinner, but I never wanted to. It was 4:00 which was my time to relax and unwind from the day. As an introvert, I had just endured hours of talking to people and only finding solace in the one time I would have a chance to use the bathroom during the day at school. Then after dinner, once the sun and my dinner had settled, I would open up my homework at the kitchen table and knock it out.
Is this an introvert thing that I don’t like 4:00? Have I reached my personal threshold by the time the clock strikes 4? Is it a younger generation thing since I have yet to experience what it is like to hold a traditional 9 to 5 where I am bound to work until it is socially acceptable to eat dinner or have a drink.
But see, today is a Sunday and I still just am not vibing with this 4:00 right now. But I think I am going to reclaim 4:00. It is my hour. It can be my hour to relax, to not talk to a single soul. I can even make myself my own little appetizer or heck even start cooking dinner, because I don’t need 5:00 to tell me what to do.
I feel kind of bad for 4:00 and it is nothing personal, I just feel frustrated that no one ever talks about this hour. Perhaps I am alone in this vendetta against 4:00, but now I feel I can move four-ward within my day and with my life growing in appreciation for the rhythm of the day. If each hour has its own rhythm then I think 4:00 is like that song that you can’t quite dance to but you don’t know all of the words so you can’t sing either. Please let me know if you have any suggestions for the song equivalent of 4:00 or a mutual distaste for the hour.
Also! I wore this dress when editing this post and then decided that after it was the perfect time to celebrate 4:00 being over by going to an outdoor happy hour and I felt this dress deserved a little outing.
