Making Daily Headlines · Page 6

Shorter Days Arrive Without Asking the Work Calendar for Permission

October 31, 2026 at 6:01 AM EDT · New York time

Seasonal affective disorder can affect people as the days grow shorter, says Dr. Norman Rosenthal, who published the first research on the condition. He discusses how to recognize symptoms and what people can do to feel better. The reporting gives a name to a seasonal pattern that can affect mood and energy. It also treats the condition as more than a joke about disliking winter. Not everyone who finds a dark afternoon inconvenient has the disorder, and people experiencing symptoms deserve more than a calendar telling them to be cheerful. The season, meanwhile, makes no accommodation for the human schedule. The sun can leave early while the inbox remains open, and the working day does not automatically become shorter because daylight does. The contrast is a familiar one: the calendar changes the light but leaves the meetings exactly where they were. Rosenthal's account focuses attention on recognizing a real condition rather than treating every winter slump as a personal failure. The office calendar may insist that November is business as usual. The outdoors has submitted a rather different assessment, written in darkness before the workday is done.

Satire. Not factual reporting. Read the original reporting from the linked publishers.