Time Zones

This track comes from Aaron's military service — Air Force enlisted, Army Infantry officer, DoD civilian at SPAWAR/NIWC. It tackles The difficulty of maintaining relationships across multiple time zones during deployment, missing holidays and milestones. The lyrics get specific — "Every holiday's a time zone that I'm never gonna grasp" — because personal tracks on Majik's are personal for real, not performatively. The rock production matches the energy of the confession. It hits lonely and yearning, in that order. Every personal track in the catalogue comes from a real moment, a real feeling, a real person. This one is no exception.

[verse 1] It's Tuesday here but Monday where you're sleeping I'm twelve hours forward and my phone is beeping With yesterday's messages about tomorrow's plans And I'm doing math on my fingers and my hands Trying to figure out when you'll be awake So I can hear your voice before my next watch breaks The satellite phone costs four bucks a minute But your laugh is worth every penny in it Happy birthday from tomorrow, Merry Christmas from the past Every holiday's a time zone that I'm never gonna grasp [chorus] We're living in different time zones Your sunrise is my midnight, sleeping alone Counting hours like they're currency I can't afford Time zones, time zones Love don't care about the international date line But my heart does, and it's running out of FaceTime We're living in different time zones [verse 2] Missed the birth, missed the birthday, missed the graduation Got the photos three days late on a bad connection Everybody's smiling in a world that kept on spinning While I'm stuck in a steel box at the beginning Of another sunset that they'll never see Another twenty-four that separates you and me They don't tell you at the recruiter's office That the hardest part of service is the hours that you've lost with The people who keep living while you're gone The world moves on, the world moves on [chorus] We're living in different time zones Your sunrise is my midnight, sleeping alone Counting hours like they're currency I can't afford Time zones, time zones Love don't care about the international date line But my heart does, and it's running out of FaceTime We're living in different time zones [bridge] Seven hours, twelve hours, negative eight I've loved you through every single Greenwich state And when I get back to your time zone, baby I'm never leaving, I'm never maybe I'm planting both feet in your present tense And making up for every moment spent On the wrong side of the clock [verse 3] Now I'm home and we're finally synchronized Same sun setting, same moon in our eyes But sometimes I still wake at oh-three-hundred Body clock still deployed, mind still numbered By the zones I've crossed and the hours I've owed To everyone who waited down this road So I hold you tighter in this time zone we share Because I know what it costs when you're not there Every second's borrowed, every minute's earned That's a deployment lesson permanently learned [chorus] We're living in the same time zone Your sunrise is my sunrise, never alone But I'll never forget the currency I spent Time zones, time zones Love survived the international date line And my heart's full, and I'm done counting FaceTime We're finally in the same time zone [outro] Same clock, same coast, same heartbeat Finally home