As I write this article on my laptop, I am currently sitting outside on a park bench wearing a light jacket. It is around 60 degrees and partly cloudy, and I can hear birds chirping in the background. The leaves on the trees are starting to grow back. It is early afternoon, and I can still feel the dew on the grass and smell it in the air.
This is a special occasion. This is the first time I’ve worked on homework outside since fall, just before the weather started to turn cold. Now, it’s starting to turn warm, and the daytime is getting longer.
Spring is back, and it’s bringing warm weather back with it.
Prepare yourself for the welcomed sight of students playing frisbee and other games on the quad, as well as students laying out and studying under the sunlight. Prepare yourself for the return of the appropriately named “dartys” that college kids love so much.
Also, prepare yourself to see a lot more smiles on the faces of people you see walking down the sidewalk. This is because when the weather is nice outside, everything seems to be better. Life doesn’t suck as much as it does when the ground is covered in snow and its freezing and its dark outside at 5 p.m.
Our problems don’t seem to matter as much when it’s warm out, since we can just go outside and enjoy the weather. We can spend more time with our friends, family and pets when it’s warm outside. We can have picnics and play games on the grass. We can play basketball on the basketball courts. We can go to baseball, softball or lacrosse games and stuff our faces with food and pass out in the stands (or, of course, you can watch the games. I’m just saying people can do that if they wanted to).
My point is that life is about to feel a lot better now that the weather is starting to turn warm again. During this unusual winter, we got a couple of tastes of nice weather during January or February, but those spells only lasted about one day or so. They mostly served as teases, giving us nice weather to enjoy before coldly taking it away from us with bitter freezing temperatures and snow storms.
But now the nice weather looks like it is here to stay. We might have to deal with a few rain showers here and there, but I will take that over snow showers any day of the week. Outdoor events like block parties, carnivals and music festivals are returning. Going to the beach, water park or even swimming in your backyard pool will be an activity you can enjoy again. Tanning outside. Water balloon fights. Even laying in a hammock and staring at the night sky.
Warm weather is back, and so are all of the activities we can enjoy doing again.
It’ll be here until hopefully November. Let’s make it count.
