It's this time of year, when spring is around the corner, that you hear people complain about winter the most. If they're not complaining about the subzero temperatures, they're complaining about the deep snow or the bitter wind.
In my opinion, they've forgotten the true misery that awaits them in the coming months.
Here are five things I like about winter, and you should, too:
1. Snow is better than slush and mud. When winter goes away, we can look forward to both, along with brown spots of mud on the back of our pant legs, brown coats of mud on our cars and brown slicks all over our streets and sidewalks.
2. It's easier to bundle up. We can always put on thicker coats when it's cold, but we can't peel off enough clothes when it's hot and humid. This thought goes through my mind every July and August when I start wondering how I can peel off my sticky, sweaty skin.
ADVERTISEMENT
3. Snowstorms are merely inconvenient. Floods, tornadoes and wildfires are disasters. To prepare for a snowstorm, we need shovels, snow-blowers and a few snowplows. We don't need a million sandbags like Fargo is stockpiling for this spring's flood, and we don't need to spend a mint to build bigger dikes like we've done in Grand Forks.
4. It's more fun to play in the snow than it is to play in the rain. Maybe this is not so true when you are a child, but I'd much rather make snowmen than mud pies.
5. Winter is a natural pesticide. Mosquitoes and ticks hate the cold a lot more than we do.
Now, I haven't mentioned skiing or hockey or sledding or snowmobiling or ice fishing, all things you can really only enjoy in the winter, nor have I mentioned winter's lack of road construction, which, if you remember, is the reason you were driving down to the Twin Cities at 50 mph last summer. And don't get me started on hay fever.
But then I wouldn't want to pile on spring and summer too much. I'm sure they feel bad as it is.
As a side note, those of you who work outside, who have to park finicky cars in the cold and can't get them started, who live on rural roads that become treacherous with ice, you can complain all you want. My fellow office drones and me have it pretty good.
Call Tran at (701) 780-1248; (800) 477-6572, ext. 1248; or send email to ttran@gfherald.com .
