winter.

its funny, what happens to your body in certain climates.

everyone warned me when we announced that we were moving outside of chicago.  they all said, 'its SO cold there.  you're going to be FREEZING.  there will be SO MUCH SNOW."

well, it turns out, we (as in, my new home) have gone something like three hundred something days without more than an inch of snow.  which is a crazy record.  the longest without snow accumulation in over seven years here.  practically unheard of.  one of the mildest winters they've seen.  unseasonably warm.

i say all of these things and it probably makes you think that the climate here, then, must not be that different.

not. true.

so everyone talks about the heat at the beach, and more than that - the HUMIDITY.  and usually people say it feels SO MUCH HOTTER.  it might be true.  it feels true.  when i spent a week in new mexico in august it was easily over a hundred degrees.  but it didnt feel as oppressively hot as it did at the beach because it was, like everyone says, a dry heat.

well, its dry here too.  but this is a dry cold.  and it makes my bones ache, my skin dry (drier than normal) and makes my nose feel like its going to bleed.  and even though there have been days over forty degrees, there have been just as many days where, while driving to work, i look at my thermometer and it reads nine.  and when i get out of the car, its still dark, and i walk around the building toward the front door and think.  holy christ, it IS cold here.  it is cold, piercing cold and dry and i might freeze and crack and turn to dust to be blown all over this windy city.

but i dont. and i pull my coat tighter and tuck my head down and keep walking.  and, like anywhere else, a few minutes after im inside im not only not freezing, im comfortably warm and content.  easy.

and then, it happened.  something changed.  something in my body.  something in the way i respond to climate.

i pulled in to work, got out of the car, without a coat because id forgotten to grab it, thinking it was in the backseat and realized that i felt - warm.  not warm like summertime, or even spring.  not close.  but so much warmer than i had been on those nine degree mornings.  comfortable even.  i pulled out my phone and and checked the weather.  thirty one degrees.  thirty one degrees and it was almost warm.

it occurred to me that this happens to people all over the world who live in climates MUCH too hot or MUCH too cold for my comfort level, with no apparent distress.  because they are able acclimate.

so, it turns out, am i.

xo.

     m.

*images do not belong to me.  search results from googling "chicago in the winter"