One surprise I experience as a resident of Texas, formally a person that lived in several much-more northern states is that I forget it isn’t as warm “up North” as it is here.

I’ll bundle up a virtual image of this near-spring day. The sun is brilliant. The trees are greening up. I see buds on some of the flowering trees and shrubbery (looks like a painting). Roses are blooming. We’ve mowed grass three times this year, and yesterday was only the 1st of March. Oh, and the “feels like” temperature is 80 degrees—time for A/C!

We aren’t weather snobs here in Texas. I know that I’m not! I remember a plethora of snowstorms when we lived in Indiana and Ohio. Several of them knocked the power out for weeks on end. The blizzard of 1978 piled snow into drifts higher than the front door of our house.

As a northerner, I often wore jackets as long as I could vs. a winter coat. I held back from turning on the furnace for the season until it was no longer reasonable to live in a chill-filled house. I planted my heels into denial that winter would soon arrive.

As I see images of snow and ice on the national news I am in awe (and feeling blessed). On the flip-side of the beauty in our Texas warmth, is when we are at 103℉, those that are still frozen (on this March 2nd day) will not be in the melting pot when we are … they’ll be at a comfortable 83℉. When the dissolve-into-a-liquid season begins, we will not see reasonable cool air again until October. Yes, the Texan climate comes with its own set of “the good and the bad,” and perhaps the ugly.

Yes, we get cold too. But only when the thermometer dips below 60 degrees … and then we believe our fingers will freeze and fall off. Yes we do.

But, today, I am feeling gifted by nature as I sing a song in my heart.

Spring whispers hello between sighs in the breeze, ushered in by brush-stroked clouds parting for brilliant.

Hello sun! Hello spring! Goodbye winter. See you another day …