It is November 23rd and this is the earliest that the ground has frozen and snow has graced it in, in a very long time. It used to be like this all the time. There used to snow on the ground from this time until the last of the snow melted in April, but it has not been true for about twenty years.
I remember my first green Christmas, it was such a novel idea that it was almost as rare as a white Christmas is these days. Almost. But the idea of having snow now, at this time of the year, staying until spring, leaves me feeling a little upset. Not for the weather, nor for the climate, but for the climate change deniers.
People that until this point would have glumly said I guess the climate is changing, those people with blessedly short memories on what past climate was like, would see early snow as proof that they were wrong. The only people that have a right to this opinion are children born in the last fifteen years, people who have only experienced warm weather. People who are older, and have experienced a "normal" progression of seasons prior to significant change should not, but too often do.
The problem is that so many people are removed from the natural world. They live in worlds where the temperature is always the right temperature and inclement weather is something that is only really viewed in that always on television screen called a window. They get into their climate controlled car from the house, which is always 21°C except when they are chilled and the thermostat is raised to 25°, move between home and office in their neat little climate controlled car, into the warm confines of their cubical. At coffee break they commiserate with their fellow inmates about how cold it is outside, even though few if any have actually spent any time out in it. People pay their heating and cooling bills with little connection to the climate except to complain that how high the bill was this month.
Look around. Look at people wear. People's dress has changed over the years. It has ceased to be functional over form, form meaning how stylish it is and how pretty it is and function is about how utilitarian it is, how well it stands up to the stresses of the environment. I dress in simple clothes, mostly t-shirts because I am mostly hot all the time, but when I am cold I do not reach for the thermostat, but I reach for another layer a thin coat or a heavy sweater made of wool. When I step out side I reach for a coat that if it is raining not do much to protect me, but will keep me warm. I have a selection of coats, light medium and heavy. To be sure, my heavy coat is a horridly ugly affair, dark blue with no decoration and solid. Actually it rips and tears too often and I have to get out a needle and repair it, but it is filled with down and it keeps my warm in a t-shirt in -20° such that I sweat profusely, and with a sweater and shirt in -30°. Much colder than that it would work as well, but those temperatures face not been too frequent, if ever felt by me, but I am sure my heavy coat would work as well. I don't get a chance to wear it much, because the winters have all been warm as of late, nothing much below -20°.
But I look at my fellow inmates and see that they wear winter wear that is thin, with good cuts that show off their bodies, with little affectations of fur, trimmings and light decoration that makes one look like they are ready for cold weather but do naught. People I see will don their pretty little clothes and go for a walk and freeze their little tushes off, and say bitterly that climate change is a myth.
Climate is something of a trend, not an event. It is an average, individual experiences of a a decade smoothed out into one idea. Climate says that we receive such and such amounts of precipitation each year, this much in snow and this much in rain that the temperatures will be about here this month and although one month may have colder temperatures as compared to year to year and more or less rain, over large time period these differences balance out. Climate change is not about the weather, it is about how the trends have been changing over the last few decades where previous decades were more static.
We have snow in the third week of November! I see, someone would say thirty years ago, winter is a week late, normally it would have come by the second week, then they would say that it might not stay, it could melt and we might not lasting snow cover until the start of December. But since people are removed from weather these days, it is not something more than an inconvenience, something to add to the water cooler chatter.
I myself will have to today get on my three layers, warm wind resistant gloves, and wool hat, don my bike helmet and head to the laundromat and later head to the grocery store and hope that the snow does not hinder my bicycle. Really, if you dress for it cold weather can be quite fun.
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