Just Thinkin' ... on the Weather

I am outraged.

Just flat out outraged.

I’m quite certain that the winter solstice was indeed dead set on introducing us to – you know – WINTER.

And, as some of you may be able to recall through the haze of your everyday, often overbooked lives, winter does not simply refer to the drop in temperature and an overwhelming series of days of grey…. no, no, no. 

You may have found yourself wandering aimlessly through your house of late, feeling a little lost. You might have felt a little discombobulated (I can’t BELIEVE spell check didn’t call me out on ‘discombobulated’) of late. Maybe you feel like something is missing, or you forgot to do something.  Maybe you’ve walked into countless rooms, intent on performing some sort of task that you would perform in, say, A ROOM, and when you get there you can’t remember why you walked into that room in the first place.   If any of these things sound familiar to you, this could be serious.  Before you panic, first check your kids’ (or grandkids’) schedules and make sure one or more of your legal charges is not waiting on the curb outside some soccer complex wondering where you are.  If you can indeed pinpoint the location of each of the children for whom you are responsible with certainty, then you may want to consider something else – something that may make you shudder.

You might…and I do mean MIGHT…want to consider something that, at this point in almost mid-FEBRUARY, could be a distinct possibility.

You could be (GASP!) missing winter.

Don’t run to the stone arch bridge and jump off of it quite yet.

Remember, I have a cracker-jack research department (funded by Kathy and Darrell who, I can tell you, pay generously with large amounts of hot beverages infused with legally addictive stimulants thus ensuring loyalty and accuracy from their research staff) and I know that it is a proven fact that if you understand something, you are far less likely to be afraid of it (thus preventing the afore mentioned concept of leaping off the stone arch bridge).

Missing winter.

What does that mean?  Why would I say that?!

It has – periodically – been cold.

It has  – for the most part – been decidedly grey.

We are  - as near as I can tell – in February (which, according to my research department, is considered a winter month).

And we have had copious amounts of precipitation in the form of…RAIN.

1.  Physically, rain is not snow.

2.  Psychologically, rain is not snow.

To point one above, my research – and a quick call to a friend who happens to be a meteorologist – tells me that we can indeed hit spring in a very healthy, no-drought situation with a rainy winter versus a snowy winter.

To point two above, my research – and a crack panel of overly educated, totally fabricated, experts from the Johns Hopkins Mao Harvard Shriners’ Children’s Grey’s Anatomy Center for Seasonal Psychological Disorders – there is a newly diagnosed, weather-related psychological syndrome that encompasses the symptoms I described earlier as related to the lack of snow facts I described after that.

It is called Abject Neurotic Geographical Seasonal Turmoil.

A.N.G.S.T.

Personally, after visiting with the experts of the JHMHSCGACSPD I felt a lot better once I was diagnosed with ANGST.

I feel that the diagnosis is at once accurate and refreshing.

I am now convinced that I may have been suffering with ANGST for years and not even known it (I feel a lot of dread and anxiety about that).

But now that I have an official diagnosis, I can work toward getting better.

The one thing that New Englanders far and wide greet with a mixture of excitement and awe is snow.  At the first few flurries, we get all excited and make sure we tell everyone we see – from our kids to fellow shoppers at Shaws – that it is, indeed, snowing (as if we are the messengers of all weather and are obviously the first one to see the first flake). 

Then…THEN…comes the first nor’easter. OH HO HO!  THAT is cause for great celebration (and photo ops!).  It is especially sweet when you don’t have to go out and can be home for it.  If you are lucky enough to have a fireplace (and some dry wood, or a multitude of Duraflame logs currently on sale at Home Depot), great quantities of coffee and/or hot chocolate, and a good book (or stash of terrific “B” movies with titles containing the words “The” and the name of any seemingly innocuous, small insects or rodents (‘The Bees’, ‘The Ants’, ‘The Bats’…) you are all set!  The Family, The Fire, The Frivolous – the three ‘Fs’ of a terrific winter storm.

I don’t ski.

I don’t snowboard.

I don’t skate, nor snowshoe, nor especially enjoy creating snowmen, women, or children.

I also don’t enjoy shoveling.

Hence, once the first nor’easter is over…I’m done.  I’ve paid my dues.  Let the yearning for spring begin!

Which means that if we have our first blizzard in November, I’m pretty much stuck with a lot of misery (and time!) until spring shows up.  It also means that I break down my suffering into digestible chunks centered on the holidays…my thought processes usually go like this:

“Oh, it’s Christmas (so there is SUPPOSED to be snow and it wouldn’t feel right without it.).”

“Well, it’s New Year’s Day and I suppose there should be snow on the ground because…well, just because it’s the first day of January.”

“It’s Super Bowl Sunday and even if the Patriots are playing somewhere sunny and warm it is always good luck for them if it is snowing here” (Please indulge my total denial that it wouldn’t have mattered this year.  I don’t want to talk about it.)”

“Hey!  February 2nd!  Groundhog Day!  At least Puxatawney Phil will give us some idea of when we’ll see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

“St. Patrick’s Day!  Hey!  We’re already in March!  The 21st is officially spring!!”

“April Fools Day!  You know, one time when I was a teenager my sister and I actually sat outside in the sun and tried to get a tan on April Fools Day!”

“Hey!  Cinco de Mao!  It’s May!  Spring MUST be coming soon!”

“Look guys!  It’s June 14th!  Flag Day!!! …”

You get the idea.  I’ll tell you though, usually by Flag Day I’m pretty much out of spring optimism.

My own acute battle with ANGST has to do with the fact that, in order to get excited about the onset of Spring – to get ridiculously, excitedly, wahoo-desperate for the weather to turn when I receive my first seed catalogs in the mail and when I purchase my first Better Homes and Gardens Special Publication on Gardens, Decks, and Landscapes – as well as to truly relish the sound of the streaming water from the spring thaw as it passes – SWISH – under my tires, I HAVE to have suffered the misery of a New England Winter. 

I need the storm itself (or storms themselves), the beauty of Dunstable the next day (compete with an impossibly blue sky), and I need the subsequent bushes damaged by plowing and snow blowing, the inevitable yellowing of patches of snow by my dogs, and the dirty, grungy slush along the streets.  I need the short days, the long nights, and the type of cold that chills my bones instantly and makes me truly believe that I’m radiating arctic air from the inside of my body out.  And I need to get to the point where I hate it all. 

Then, and only then, can I guarantee myself the impatience for - and the giddiness at - the arrival of spring (mud and all!)  to our fair town.

Without all that, I’m done for.  I’ll end up suffering ANGST until the next, well-deserved (well suffered-for) spring (complete with tantalizing seed catalogs and Better Home and Gardens Special Publications).

The really sad part is that even though the experts at the Johns Hopkins Mao Harvard Shriners’ Children’s Grey’s Anatomy Center for Seasonal Psychological Disorders have identified ANGST as a serious disorder, the folks at the Bristol Myers Smith Kline Novaris Johnson and Johnson pharmaceutical firm have not yet come up with a pill that has enough side-effects warnings to keep me from ingesting it in the first place.

If any of you have some idea of helping me deal with this (that doesn’t have anything to do with skiing, snowboarding, snow shoeing, or shoveling) please let me know ASAP.

The ANGST is killing me.

Thanks for readin’.

Lisa

Update written on Saturday, February 12th at 11:32 a.m. (according to my Charter-issued cable box) during the first nor’easter of the season when I cannot turn to any Boston-based television station without seeing the words “StormTrak 5”, “First Alert Extreme Team”, or “7 News StormForce”.

Wahoo.

I’m cured.