Spring!

For the next few days, at least. A high of 74 degrees today? Sign me up!

I really enjoy spring, if only because I hate winter so much. Walking to class no longer requires the lengthy ritual of gathering hat, scarf, boots, coat. The price of strawberries comes down. I get to see the full range of fashions among my classmates - hipsters in floaty ragdoll dresses and gladiator sandals, jocks in shorts, sorority girls in really shorts. Tattoos peek out just like tulips. College Green is suddenly swamped with people and their impossibly small puppies (yesterday I saw two little Yorkies who together could have sat comfortably on my laptop). The hippie teachers take their classes outside - I don't know why, because attention spans drop like a rock. Perhaps for the benefit of passing tour groups?

It's a little funny, because I used to actually fear spring. I was deathly afraid of tornadoes, and it didn't help that ever March through elementary school, we started our weather unit learning about them. I would dread days that were warm and humid. I'd check weather.com's Thunderstorm Forecast - if we were in the "severe" region, I'd feel sick the rest of the day. I used to shake whenever we had severe weather. Once I had a session with Dr. M while we were under a tornado watch (back before the ED), and that was pretty much all we talked about.

Needless to say I don't do that anymore. The summer I lived alone, I think, was when I stopped being so irrationally scared of some things (some things, mind you, there are still plenty). There was no one around to listen to me or take care of me - I had to do it myself. So I kept the TV on, I watched the sky a bit, and I knew I could dive into the little hidey-hole under the stairs if I needed to. I didn't panic, I didn't shake, I didn't get sick. I just knew I had to take care of myself. More than that, I knew I could take care of myself.

Hmm. Maybe that's something to keep in mind.