Midwestern winters are an endurance race, the ironman of seasons. It’s not the cold, snow, and never ending winds that burn your skin and bring tears to your eyes. It’s not the dirty slushy roads, icy sidewalks, and salt stains on your shoes. The real pain of winter is how long it is. The first few months are ok. You have Thanksgiving and Christmas, the promise that New Years brings. But by February, March, and even into April, it’s as if it will never end. And it’s not just those of us who despise all that is winter (myself included), even those who love winter are complaining at this point. The whole attitude of the community changes and you hear conversations as you walk through the grocery store or workplace, “Is it ever going to be spring again?”
So you see, summer is a gift to be cherished. Wisconsin summers are almost as perfect as you can get. I often wonder why it can’t be this way year round, but would we appreciate it as much? We cram as much as we can into each day because we know it won’t last. It’s inevitable, winter will come looking for us again. But we don’t talk about that. Not yet. For now we spend as much time as we can outside, camp fires, boat rides, baseball games, cookouts, sitting on the deck with a bottle of wine and the quiet of a cool summer night. We let the chores go, don’t worry about the laundry or the floors that need to be swept. Those things can wait. We need to store up as much sunshine in our bones as possible, to survive the months ahead.