dear winter: we are so not friends anymore.

At first, it was cute: the snowflakes, the chill in the air, the Christmas music that stations played prematurely. For years, I liked you and your holidays. I liked wearing sweaters and cute coats, sipping hot coffee or peppermint hot cocoa. When you would come back into my life each year, I could anticipate coming home from college or getting a break from homework. You signaled a respite, a getaway, a break.

Of course, there were problems. There are always problems. But I learned to deal with my skin cracking, my ears turning red, my body repeatedly freezing and thawing between buildings and errand stops. I got used to wearing extra layers and shivering under my down comforter at night.

Last year was the hardest, probably: commuting to classes where I walked a ways to get there, my few inches of exposed face would redden and chill with the harshness of your cold. My eyes watered, my lips chapped. It was ugly.

This year, we’ve only just begun, you and I. Yet you’re already pulling your old tricks, winter, and I’m sick of it. Saturday, downtown, you hit us so hard with snow that our car skid and slid and got stuck in a parking space. Icicles hardened on the car while we drove. I was scared, scared the way I was when my car flipped on your icy roads, scared the way I was when I slipped on frozen sidewalks.

I guess what I’m saying is I’ve had enough, and I want you gone. Yet if past experience is any indicator, you won’t leave easily. I imagine I have a good three months or more to deal with your bitter, bitter temperatures and continually threatening elements. I’ll feel like napping at four o’clock in the afternoon because it’s getting dark outside. I’ll have to work on Christmas Eve.  I’ll waste personal time by shoveling snow from the driveway.

You may win this year, but it’s not over. Someday, winter, I’ll go somewhere where you can’t mess with me anymore: somewhere beautiful like California or a beachy town in  a resort community. I’m just biding my time, still looking for a way out. It will come at some point, and I’ll be gone so fast you won’t remember me. Someday, winter. Someday.

Filed under the everyday |