A Response

(Let me just say up front that my grudge is against the month of March, not against Brady, to whose blog this is a response, nor his resolute assertion that March = spring, which I think is really quite admirable in the face of all the counter-evidence.)

I lied about something last night. I claimed that March is my least favorite month, but according to myself, it is actually February. I understand my own confusion. Most months have redeeming qualities, mainly being that at least seven of them cannot be considered winter. Of the winter months, November and December are early enough in the season that winter can seem sort of cozy, and they are chock full of holidays oriented around spending time with family and good friends. January is when winter starts to become wearying, but it also holds the excitement of a new year, and there is typically (though not this year) a January thaw to remind us that spring is not just a theoretical construct.

But by February and March, I am just tired of winter. I want it to be over. Yesterday we hit single digit temperatures, and our high was less than twenty degrees, and while I survived many, many days like that this year, yesterday it just felt draining. I looked at the weather forecast and instead of feeling happy that we would get back above freezing in two days, I felt resentful that we had to wait even that long. I dislike February because it's usually the worst winter weather at a time when no one wants winter weather anymore. I dislike March because after February it feels like we deserve a little spring, but in Michigan, March is not spring. Logically it is supposed to be. Practically, it is still the dead of winter, right up until the very end.

So since I can't decide which month will earn its place as my least favorite month of all, I thought that, here on my blog, I would perform that great exercise intended to make any major life decision for you: The Pro/Con List. Which, incidentally, failed me in my decision of where to go to grad school (my pro/con list put me in Georgia), but might be more effective in a slightly less monumental life decision like choosing which month is my least favorite of all months.

February
Pros: My birthday. My brother's birthday. My sister's birthday. Valentines Day treats. Valentines. Being only 28 days long. Spring break.

Cons: Winter. Really cold, horrible, no-end-in-sight winter. Winter when no one wants it to be winter anymore. Snow that doesn't melt. Sub-zero temperatures. The Deadly Sheet of Ice. Hitting the part of the semester where the initial excitement has worn off, but April is still too far away to see the end.

March
Pros: A couple days that feel like spring is on the way. Birds chirping. Longer days. Light in the evening. Pi day.

Cons: Winter. Days that feel like spring is on the way only to turn suddenly into snow and wind and sub-freezing temperatures. Leafless trees when things are starting to turn green elsewhere in the country. No major holidays other than St. Patrick's Day (which is kind of a boring holiday unless you drink, are Irish, or are passionate about the color green). The time change, which plunges the world into darkness just when it's starting to get light early enough for me to run in the mornings again. Realizing just how soon the end of the semester will come, and just how much I haven't done yet. No days off of school. Wind. Wind that makes the slightly warmer temperatures of March feel much colder than they actually are.


Looking over my list, I would say that March loses here. Or wins. Whichever one means that March earns its place as my least favorite month. But this blog post kind of has a touch of Eeyore, and the truth is that neither month is all depressing and gray and wintery all the time. I think I sort of have two moods, my regular mood, and my weather mood, and they are not completely intertwined. While good weather has enormous power to enhance my outlook on life in general, bad weather just means I'm unhappy with the weather. When I said in my earlier blog post that I don't tend to look back on February and think, You know, I was awfully happy with life back in February, I guess I must not have been in the middle of a very pleasant February. Because I think for the most part, while I had my ups and downs, I was happy with life this February. In fact, it was a rather nice February, as far as Februarys go.

And so, in spite of my strong negative feelings towards the month of March, and the strong likelihood that March will put me in a bad weather mood, that doesn't mean it can't still be a good month in general. It was six degrees this morning, but Yahoo! Weather says it will be 54 degrees on Friday. March last year meant passing my prelims, and this year it will (hopefully) mean getting my dissertation proposal approved. My Facebook social calendar is getting full. The class I teach is finally starting to flow. There's always the possibility that March won't be as windy and cold and unspringlike as it normally is, but even if it is, and even if it is worse than normal, there's also an even stronger possibility that I'll still feel happy with life anyway. 

Summer is traditionally my happiest time of year, followed by fall, followed by spring. But I have been and can be happy in winter, too, so here's to a lovely, happy, wintery March.