Cold

I appreciate the change of seasons. I believe I probably appreciate summer more because of winter's existence. I love spring when it's just budding and blooming, that warm wave in the air that wakes up the grass. (I always say I can smell the photosynthesis and it's fantastic. Erich wants to find some way to prove whether what I'm smelling is actually photosynthesis.) I like summer when I can wear skirts and flip flops all the time. I like the crisp air of autumn when the leaves are changing. I even like snow, when it's pretty and sparkly around Christmastime, before it turns into disgusting mounds of icy dirt. I'm a born and raised Midwesterner and this is "my" climate.

BUT

Even though I've always felt a bit down in February and March (and even, most years, April) when winter is supposed to be fading and then gone but isn't, I'm starting to really, seriously feel like I want to move somewhere warmer. Exactly a year ago, Erich and I were in San Diego and it was the best place ever, climate-wise. And don't even get me started on Hawaii. I wouldn't need hideous mountains of ancient snow to help me appreciate the natural beauty of that great state. I could certainly handle living in Texas or Florida, or somewhere southern where winter is chilly and not horrendous.

Just, please, get me away from the kind of place where the temperatures drop below freezing in early December and stay that way and it snows on St. Patrick's Day. And if we could arrange it so I could still see my family all the time, I'd be set.