On Winter
Although the weather is nice now I am in dread. Soon it will be winter. For many years I have been in denial, but now I am stating it openly: to a first approximation, I despise winter. My willingness to tolerate winter has diminished as I have aged, and I don't think I can take much more.
Southwestern Ontario winters are not that cold (especially with climate change) but they are cold enough. More importantly, in the winter the sky is gray and cloudy almost every day. I know I have to spend some time outdoors each day for my health, but I am reluctant to go outside. When I am outside it is too cold to read or use a computer, so all I can do is listen to podcasts or walk in silence. Even listening to podcasts is unpleasant because in the cold my batteries do not last long, so I am continually fumbling with bare hands to change batteries.
Meanwhile, indoor conditions are not much better. Since COVID I have been reluctant to spend time in indoor public spaces, which means that when I am indoors I am almost always in my room. My room has poor airflow and in the winter I can't open the window, so the air is stale and my room is smelly. I don't have a comfortable place to concentrate, so I don't conentrate. Instead I sit and waste time and suffer for months on end.
I bike in the winter but it is fairly unpleasant to do so. My winter bike is slow. The lock freezes up, causing great consternation. The cold is much more acute when biking than when walking. Mostly it is tolerable except for my extremities -- hands and feet get acutely cold when winter cycling. The expensive pogeys I purchased help with the hands, but my feet get so numb that I can barely walk after a long ride. Sometimes my bike will break in some way, and then I have to do repairs in the cold with my bare hands, which is phenomenally unpleasant.
Many roads are plowed suboptimally, leaving icy spots -- and don't get me started on the conditions of the fancy bike infrastructure the bike zealots are always pushing for. Somehow on country roads they can keep bike lanes cleared up to the curb, but apparently this is impossible in the city. I can expect to fall at least once a season thanks to black ice or unexpected mud.
Winter biking is also slushy, which often makes my pants wet. Then I get painful purple bruises on my thighs. This is probably not frostbite proper (although I wonder sometimes), but is probably on that spectrum. Being cold and wet in the winter feels terrible, and it happens more than I would like.
I despise the end of Daylight Savings Time. I despise the short days and the early sundowns. They take a great toll on me. Cloudy weather during the day is pretty bad, but it is much better than night weather.
For exercise I have been skating in the winter but I do not enjoy this at all. Maybe it is because I have gained a lot of weight or maybe it is because my skates are old, but these days my ice skates hurt my feet when I wear them. Moreover, the ice rinks I use (primarily those at Kitchener City Hall, Waterloo Town Square or Victoria Park) are all unpleasant in different ways. At Kitchener City Hall there are often rowdy high school students or other young hotdoggers who engage in thoughtless horseplay. The Waterloo Town Square rink is tiny. The Victoria Park rinks are very large, but they are uneven, so you have to skate uphill for part of the loop. I have not improved my skating technique for the decade (or longer?) I have been skating, so it is embarrassing to be on the ice.
Tobogganing might be one of the more dangerous pasttimes out there. It can be fun but is treacherous, and I do not partake.
Although I tolerate snow I don't love it. I don't particularly enjoy shovelling the walkway, even though I only clear a small section of sidewalk. Some of the neighbours never get around to clearing their walkways, so walking up and down the street becomes a treacherous, slippery experience.
People like winter because of the holidays, but I don't like any winter holidays. I don't like Halloween or Thanksgiving or Christmas or New Year's or Valentine's Day, and I don't participate in any of the ritual consumptions involved with these celebrations. Even for normal people it seems these celebrations of joy turn out more stressful than celebratory.
Winter is supposed to be beneficial because it kills off ticks and bugs and other pests that would otherwise extend their range northward. Unfortunately, global warming has made winter less potent, so even this benefit is muted.