Let's Talk About the Weather

By Maranda Bennett on March 7, 2017

Since New York has been awkwardly broaching the subject of spring for a while now, like a British guy agonizing over whether to ask the person seated next to him to get up so he can use the airplane lavatory, I’ve decided to write about everyone’s favorite topic: the weather.

Even if I haven’t gone outside all day, I can feel the effects of the weather influencing me from afar. It seems to permeate everything, intruding into the manmade asylum of my dorm room and working its mysterious magic on my mood.

For the sake of science, I have compiled a comprehensive list of weather types and their corresponding psychological effects. Without further ado, I present to you the wonders of the elements.

1. Hot

Those Instagram pics of suavely smiling sundress-clad girls with glowing tans and immaculately burnished hair like the winged helmet of Hermes? Yeah, no, that’s not me. I’m the one huffing and puffing in the background, trying to keep my face from running and my hair from becoming so frizzy that it shrivels up, falls off, and bounces away like a tumbleweed.

http://25.media.tumblr.com

2. Stupid Hot

On “stupid hot” days, I feel like the world is ending. It literally can NEVER have been this hot before anywhere, in the history of humanity. Either global warming is very, very real, or the world is slowly exploding, enveloping us all in its fiery magma breath that’s been trapped in its core for billions of years. Like really deadly morning breath, only much, much worse.

3. Cold as Hell

The icy fang of winter is upon you. Don your sealskin boots and mammoth fur cap, and try to stop yourself from anxiously thinking about that one Jack London story every time your fingers or ears go numb. At least you can exhale and pretend you’re a dragon. There is that.

https://media.tenor.co

4. Raining

On rainy days I like to meander alone through the desolate streets, staring profoundly into the distance and greeting the passers-by with wistful glances of vague recognition. Ah, another lone dreamer, out seeking themselves in the melancholy half-light of the city.

Unless, of course, I don’t have my umbrella, in which case I’m sprinting across campus, red-faced, frizzy-haired, and unapologetically shoving old ladies into giant puddles.

5. Snowing

Miracle of miracles! Delightful throngs of rosy-cheeked children gather in the park to make stunted snowmen and pelt each other with hard-packed globules of ice. I am reminded of all the Christmases I’ve ever spent, and how I’ll never be able to return to those magical days of childhood, and how maybe I will start a family, after all, one of these days, and then how, god no, what am I thinking, I don’t want kids. Might as well just sign my life away, right? Obnoxious little brats.

6. WTF?

Sometimes the weather just doesn’t even know anymore. It’s like the troposphere is having a midlife crisis; if it were a person, it would be chugging probiotics and cruising around town in a brand new Corvette. Is it raining? Snowing? Drizzling, even? Drizzling is valid. Just pick something and stick to it!

cdn.playbuzz.com

7. Thunder and Lightening, Very Very Frightening

This weather is like a Long Island iced tea of viscerally terrifying God-rage. Tornados, tsunamis, cabbage-sized hailstones, witches on broomsticks gleefully whizzing through the chaotic skies. We are jolted by a deafening clap of thunder and reminded of the fearsome power of Mother Nature. She is angry; take cover while you can.

8. Ahhhhh.

A gentle spring breeze sways the magnolia blossoms as the slanted sunlight plants a thousand kisses on your skin. Planet earth is conducive to organic life forms, after all. Everything is beautiful, and nothing hurts. This is the kind of weather that makes putting up with all the other crap worth it. Nature is coming back with an apology letter and a box of chocolates, begging for another chance. We forgive you.