Much Ado About Everything

If you’re living in Vancouver, you are certainly painfully aware of the horrible weather we’ve been suffering since last fall. The worst of all is lack of sunshine – it feels like it’s been ages since we last saw sun. In fact there was an article on CBC website about Vancouver getting 130 fewer hours of sunny weather since November than normal. In other words, we have missed two to three months of sun! That’s pathetic in itself since we’re supposed to only get 45-50 hours of sun per month during winter. Looks like the mister (or missus?) upstairs has been sleeping on the job, or worse.

But that’s not all. Not only it wasn’t sunny, but it was rainy! Cold, rainy, wet, soggy, you name it – we’ve had it. In fact it was so bad that we’re on track of defeating the previous all-time rainy March record of 1997. The sad thing is, I remember that winter well too, unfortunately. It’s been terrible, and I recall taking a day off immediately upon seeing sun outside; something I did two weeks ago as well, when I took an unexpectedly sunny Tuesday afternoon off.

Due to gray and soggy weather, the people’s mood has been bad lately – at least mine was. I normally like gray days because they enable me to enjoy time at home – no hot apartment and no bright sun reflecting off my monitors and TVs that I’m trying to watch (what else do I do anyway?). But I still want it to be sunny when I’m not at home and when I go out or frequently during the day; just not when it’s inconvenient. Without any sun for months, I was really starting to feel like I was in a prison. I was feeling claustrophobic, like the gray sky was closing on me. I wanted to go out and take a walk, but I couldn’t as it was constantly raining – often hard – and it was cold. And on those few days when it wasn’t raining, the cold wind was blowing, making it still uncomfortable to be outside. I was spending my days doing the same routine, going to same places and it was staring to get to me really badly.

So yesterday as I walked home from the restaurant with some friends I was giddy as a kid when the sun showed up. It was only half an hour before sunset, but I was genuinely happy and jumping up and down the street. I’m surprised I wasn’t called on that; perhaps others were just as happy, but chose not to show it. Anyway, the effect was amazing and almost instantaneously I could feel those months of gray prison drying away.