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To see weather reports of winter back in Minnesota as I've traveled around the American Southwest in search of an escape from something that never really arrived this year has been a kind of punishment and a test of my moral character, a test which I have failed.
I know it says something about my character that I believe the suffering of my friends and acquaintances and the whole of the people of Minnesota experiencing frigid temperatures that rival the worst days of Antarctica would actually increase my enjoyment proportionally of the (generally) warmer climes I currently inhabit. But to see only a 5- or 10-degree difference in temperatures between Arizona and Minnesota? That is not why I traveled these 2,000 miles.
Minnesota has this year experienced the winter that never was. No cold, no snow — at least not to the standards by which Minnesotans typically judge these things. Sure, the temperature has dropped below freezing. And sure, there have been dustings of snow, and frozen lake ice. But all have been mild and fleeting, like a Midwestern dinner guest, one who snacks on a bell pepper and exclaims that it is much too spicy, and besides, it is getting quite late.
I traveled west to witness suffering from afar. To escape the horror of Minnesota's longest season. And for me to properly escape those horrors, they must be seen and heard about in news headlines read from afar, or recounted in text threads among friends, or via Zoom meetings with coworkers, and through the comforting observation of intensely bitter and exasperated social media updates. (It's so cold out my eyelashes froze! sad emoji!)
I left on Jan. 4 and won't return until April, and through the whole of it I've read of nothing but record warmth. This ghastly report from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (tinyurl.com/lost-winter) nearly shattered my frozen heart: "Winter heat waves in December, January, and February produced record high temperatures, record high minimum temperatures, all-time monthly high temperatures, and some 'firsts' for winter warmth too. … [T]he Twin Cities broke its record for number of 50 F days for the season by early February, racking up 18 by the end of the month. St. Cloud and the Twin Cities both observed their longest January thaw on record. Rochester and the Twin Cities both observed their warmest February day in recorded history" — with those records going back nearly 150 years.
It has been, for me, the most brutal of winters. Instead, what I would have liked to have read and heard about are multiple consecutive days without the temperature rising above zero — streaks of 10 or more, which I have been privy to in my more than 20 years as a resident of the North Star State, would be ideal. While I, traveling and working from my RV through Arizona, Nevada, Southern California and more, cross my legs and let my flip-flops dangle from my toes in the sunshine of a beach chair as I open Facebook to post a subtle inquiry as to whether it might indeed be so, my dear friends. And is that just a hint of sunburn I detect upon the back of my neck?
Instead, even today, the disappointments never cease. Here on the border of southern Utah the temperature was actually several degrees cooler than in Minneapolis for most of a recent week. And not long ago while I was camping at Lake Mead near Las Vegas in 65-and-sunny temperatures — otherwise perfectly enjoyable weather — Minneapolis and St. Paul were experiencing 70 degrees — an absolutely unprecedented and unacceptable contrast.
But soon I will be making my way back home toward Robbinsdale, and it is not yet April, and so I know for a fact that I'll be bringing winter with me, for suffering long follows those who wish it upon others. April showers bring May flowers? Oh no, not this year. I can feel it in my bones already.
Adam Overland, of Robbinsdale, is a writer and editor. He writes about his travels and other experiences at adamoverland.com.
