I love the heat. I love the cold. I love the mild weather of fall, and the pleasant weather of spring. I love everything in and of its season.
I do not love sweat dripping down every uncomfortable crevice in my body when I take a walk. I do not love my nose hairs freezing. I do not love my backyard flooding, and I do not love spiders. The problem is, all of the good of the seasons comes with the bad. You can’t have warm cups of cocoa before a fire if it’s not booger-icing cold outside. And you can’t have laughing splashes at the pool if it’s not hot enough to defrost the glaciers. Spring and fall are supremely pleasant, but that also makes them limiting. I don’t want to jump into a fountain when it’s seventy degrees outside, and shepherd’s pie can only be enjoyed while wearing a sweater, when the dish harkens back to the wind-blown chill of a sea-splattered Irish cliffside.
The season we’re in sucks. But it’s also wonderful. I don’t think I could live in a place that was only ever pleasant. Those pleasant days are absolutely wonderful, but they’re also dull. They’re only made wonderful due to the harshness of the days around them. And those harsh days are themselves full of unique delights that could not be otherwise enjoyed.
I don’t want to drink an oatmeal stout in the summer, and I don’t want to drink a fruited sour in the winter. But there’s nothing better than a crisp fruity beer when the condensation on the glass runs as freely as the sweat across your brow, or a stiff stout to go with that shepherd’s pie when the gales outside tell of old Blarney tales. And wheat beers in the spring feel right. I’m not sure exactly why. Maybe the heady yeast reminds of the pollen in the air, and it wouldn’t taste as good without that floral accompaniment. And Oktoberfests in the fall or pumpkin beers make you want to dance a harvest dance, and wouldn’t that be a silly thing to do in July?
I love that everything has its season. And I love the variety of those seasons. This is why I actually get disappointed when we don’t have a few days or even a week or so during winter when the weather is so bad it’ll chase my imagination right out of Ireland and into the arctic. It kills off the ticks and makes you feel alive. So long as you don’t freeze to death, of course. And the summer is bound to have some days that are so oppressively hot it makes you get creative with the application of water, none of which would happen if it wasn’t so hot you’d go insane if you didn’t splash around a bit.
So I love these extremes, and the seasons. They make it a little harder to get through the days, but those challenges are what we call fun. They keep you alive. Until they kill you. So as long as I’m not old enough to be vulnerable to these extremes, I’ll keep enjoying them. And when I am too old to do so, I’ll move. But then that will be a season too.