I live in the most hypochondriac state in prob’ly the entire world, which is hilarious because we are considered granola by like most other state standards, and could feature on the cover of every Wheaties box from now to kingdom come.
…We are outdoorsy as hell, will climb anything, run anywhere, backpack for months, grow and compost our own food with our our waste products, join in every diet fad, fuel up with every vitamin supplement in existence, put sunscreen on when it rains, and show up in droves to picket dirty energy Big Biz when it wants to build some kinda new cancer-inducing shit in our backyards.
…All of which is rather industrious of us.
…But we also, will go absofuckinglutely bat-shit, if anyone, at any point, mentions the word, “snow.”
(We do it with “earthquake” too…and coming from the mountains of CA, I think both fetish-freakouts, are hilarious.)
…I think it’s because we are not properly equipped for either, in any great way…in that they happen so infrequently, there is no “plan of attack.” We only have enough plows to attack major roadways, so: you’re screwed getting out of your neighborhood to them, and they don’t do the useless-but-regular trainings for school children and employees to duck-and-cover under desks and stand in doorways — in case of a quake.
…We are made to feel essentially helpless in these moments, which I suppose is what fuels the end-of-times panic reaction that both words elicit…so that everyone is running to Costco stocking up their built-from-100%-recycled-material panic rooms, and debating every possible disaster scenario over the water cooler, like: Move over “Survivor XX,” shit gets real now.
…Which is essentially what we’ve been dealing with — all week long–from customers and retailers and builders.
…Until, finally: it came.
It snowed for five seconds last night, and my side of the state is all:
(Throwing up hands)
“That’s it! Cancel everything! Close all the theatres and the schools! Blackout the offices! Bet you’re glad you maxed out your Lowes card on that generator! And slugged that guy in Costco for the last giant flat of Dinty Moore stew! Where are the cell battery back ups?! Holy hell, how will our Christmas gifts from Amazon even make it through now?! ”
Five. Seconds.
Today at work, everyone I talk to is like, “Wow, yeah, we need to cancel that… The weather is just too crazy of an x-factor. ” And outside my window, as people continue to live in their little worlds of total hypochondriac denial: it is raining.
…Not even a lot.
…It’s even doing that half-assed.
…It’s spitting. Weakly.
…Which is one of many reasons that my current home town just cracks me the hell up.
(Together with the slogs of people who sign up for races all year round. Because, they claim there’s this thing called “runners-high.” Which, unlike Santa, is totally fake. And everyone knows it.)
~D