I don’t care that I’m in the minority. Give me chilly winds and icy skies. Give me naked trees reaching their gnarled limbs in every direction. Give me the nostalgia of snow days and canceled classes, empty hours with nothing of import to fill them with. Those were simpler times. Maybe it’s because I associate winter with my childhood, and staying home and watching movies with my mom without the encumbrance of a “non-traditional instruction day” (really, tell me something technology hasn’t destroyed).

Summer is not my jam anyway. Too hot, especially in the South. Good God, you can’t take your clothes off fast enough in air so hot and sticky just breathing is an insurmountable chore. I mean, it has its perks, especially when you’re a kid. Summer vacation, no school, you know the drill. Swimming and traveling and running in the grass under the hot sun until your pants and shirt are stained with chlorophyll and your skin is pink with sunburn (or in my delicate case, sun poisoning).

Added is the fact that summer is bittersweet because you know it will never last. The days will grow shorter and colder. The leaves will turn and you’ll return to school and the hustle and bustle of life. Winter Is Coming, indeed.

But in winter, there is always hope. Hope that you can’t find in summer, which is this…spring is on its way.

Thanks as always for being a faithful reader of The Voracious Bibliophile. If you like what you see, please like, comment, follow, and subscribe to my email list to get notified of new posts as soon as they drop. You can also email me at fred.slusher@thevoraciousbibliophile.com or catch me on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest @voraciousbiblog. Keep reading the world, one page (or pixel) at a time.