What kind of terrible person hates summer?
It’s me. Hi. I’m the problem, it’s me (to quote a newly engaged woman).
Longtime readers of the Post know that I hate the summer months of June, July, and August with the intense heat of a thousand suns (which is often what those months feel like).
Summer is overrated. I think there’s a secret summer society that has people brainwashed that June, July, and August are the perfect months. The sun! The heat! The beaches! The cookouts! To which I would add: The bugs! The sweltering heat! The sunburns!
Remember those Country Time lemonade mix commercials, the ones that lamented that “summer will be a short 94 days?” I used to think, really, it’s going to be that long?
I bet if you really pinned people down and promised to keep their responses anonymous, they would actually admit that fall is better than summer.
(Kids aren’t factored in that polling because they get out of school in the summer and are carefree for three months (though I bet they love getting new school supplies). I have to do the same exact things I do the other months of the year; the only difference is I sweat more.)
I like the “Ber” months,” the months of fall and early winter: September, October, November, December.
There’s a great argument to be made that the new year should start in September instead of January. I wouldn’t make that argument myself, but I could!
Vacations are over, kids are back in school, adults have a new focus on work, people are making plans, the weather is changing. There’s an energy that happens in the fall that you don’t get in the lazy days of summer. There’s more of a fresh, new-feeling start as the calendar ticks over from August to September than there is when we go from December to January. Labor Day could be the new New Year’s.
There’s also better food in the fall and winter. Comfort foods like hot, hearty soups and chili. Pasta and stews and pies. We can turn on the oven again in the “Ber” months.
What do we eat in the summer? A salad? Yeah, that’s comforting.
Holidays? I’ll take Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas over St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, and the Fourth of July. All of the holidays from March until August put together don’t add up to the three big holidays you get in the fall and winter.
Clothing? In the warm, sticky months you wear shorts and gross flip-flops. I don’t need to see anyone’s feet. In the “Ber” months, there are more clothing options, and I’m actually more comfortable in jeans, a sweatshirt, or a flannel shirt than I am with less clothing in the summer.
You say the “Ber” months are the “Brrr” months? So what? Are you a construction worker? Are you a mail carrier? Then why are you concerned with how cold it is? Go inside your home and turn up the heat. Wrap yourself in a blanket and make yourself a cup of tea.
Tea is the official drink of fall and winter, by the way.
Even arts and entertainment are better in the fall. The movies seem to be of better quality, the big books come out. Sure, fall TV isn’t quite what it used to be (new shows premiere year-round now), but people still look forward to September and October when new seasons of their old favorite shows start.
Every August, local newscasters and meteorologists sigh heavily that the summer is ending. The nice temperatures are going away! Can’t we prolong the summer a little bit longer? They get all upset that instead of it being 90 it’s 68, which apparently is some unbearable temperature.
I submit to you that “nice weather” in the summer is actually pretty rare. I’d rather view the spectacular brown and gold treescape above or snowy winter scenes than a bright sun broiling asphalt.
You say I can just turn on the air conditioner in the summer if it’s too hot and humid? I don’t have an air conditioner, and people who don’t have an air conditioner can’t escape the heat and humidity (I don’t know what it’s like where you live, but here in New England, all homes come with heat but you usually have to add the A/C yourself). You can always put on another piece of clothing if it’s too cold. If you keep taking off an article of clothing when it’s too hot, eventually someone will call the police (and they’ll be filming you on their phone and putting it online).
Of course, a lot of this is a regional thing. There are more warm months in places like Texas and Arizona and Florida, and it’s a regular thing for them. Which is why I would never live in Florida (and the weather is only one of approximately eleven reasons why I would never live in Florida).
So I’m happy that it’s after Labor Day. The next four months are the most wonderful time of the year. And even when the “Ber” months are over, everything is still good because then we get the “Ary” months. As a lover of the cold and snow, I welcome them too.
I own sweaters and I know how to use them.
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Comments
I totally agree!!! I’ve always said I hate summer. I live in the panhandle of Florida and it’s hot!!! It was fine when I was younger. We grew up with no air conditioner and we played barefoot all summer in the woods. We also helped with large gardens and had to pick black berries and blue berries. It didn’t seem too hot then, but now I don’t go outside unless I have to.
You make a lot of good points, Bob. I’ve had a surprisingly cool (for summer) weather in northwest L.A. up until about August 20th. The last 2+ weeks very hot. So 3+ weeks left in Sept., and October can be hot and draining too. Visually you see the leaves falling which is pretty, but should go with crisp, cool air, which apparently is too much to ask!
The school kids have already been back in school now for a few weeks; awful. Going from the hot to cold as in outside to inside, can make you sick or feel rundown. Tomorrow I’m getting my flu shot and buying some containers of matzo bal and chicken soup from Weiler’s Deli. It’s more of a winter thing, yes, but I need it now. It works.
I totally get where this guy is coming form!
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I grew up in Miami FL and I was THRILLED to move to Oklahoma and find out what the Change of Seasons is. I like Fall a lot, especially the food! Winter has a lot of charm. Snow is AMAZING, I’m in my 60s and build a Snowman if we have enough snow. Most snowfalls though are cleared from the roads by Mother Nature by 10am. We rarely have to shovel.
But I have to say Spring is probably my favorite, I’m a Master Gardener and seeing the bulbs, perennials, trees and shrubs coming to life and burst into bloom is nothing short of a Gift from God.
Hear, hear! If I had designed the seasons, they’d be like the classic Saul Steinberg drawing of the United States from the perspective of New York City.
I’d still have a summer, from about June 20 until August 1. In August, the only real change would be a cooling off, with average nighttime lows and daytime highs 20° lower than they’d been in the summer. This wouldn’t happen in a day, but over ten.
In early September the leaves would begin to turn, but at half the rate of speed at which they turn, peak, and start to drop as things are. But from September 20 to mid November, True Autumn would obtain. By Thanksgiving, the branches would be bare.
I would not allow it to snow until December 20. As a good King would, I would restrict howling blizzards to two per winter. Spring would begin before it’s ready, at about the time it does now, the better to keep it in line. My Springs would have three day rains, and I think I would schedule a couple of them for my six weeks before Winter, as well.
This is a program which could only adduce to the health and flourishing of the human race.