As a native of the ever-snowy, ever-freezing state of Minnesota, I was curious to experience my first Ohio winter three years ago as a freshman at Denison University. While winter has never exactly been my favorite season, there is something about the first snow of the season that is so exciting and fulfilling. Pressing your face up against the window to catch a glimpse of the first snow awakens the inner child in oneself. After a hot fall in 2019 (I still get Snapchat memories showcasing the 80 degree weather of that October), the winter season that followed was lacking. Needless to say I was shocked when the clouds followed a repetitive rainy (rather than snowy) schedule up until the holidays. Snow and December are synonyms in my head but apparently that was not the case in Ohio.
This fall semester, now in its very last week, I believe it has snowed once in Granville. That snowy morning, while certainly magical, lasted for a few hours tops, the snow itself sticking around for maybe a day. Since then, we have been living in a perpetual state of dreariness: 40 degrees, cloudy, on-and-off rain. Something that I couldn’t help but enjoy this past week about the winter weather was the foggy mist that engulfed Denison’s hill for two and a half days. As someone who works on campus in the mornings, there is nothing more mysterious and spooky than walking to class in thick fog that blankets the buildings and trees. But just like the snow, the fog unfortunately departed, ushering in another round of cloudy, rainy days.
Despite the disappointment I have felt with Ohio winters, I am appreciate of the rainy winter months simply because they indicate a changing of the seasons. While Californians may live in blissful warm weather year round, I think it would be difficult living in a place that experiences little to no temperature/weather changes. I can’t complain too much about the mildness of the temperature after grumbling about the below-zero days I have experienced in Minnesota. Plus I am someone who believes that a winter sunset trumps a summer one any day; some of these Ohio December sunsets have been worth the pain of the season itself. My rating of this year’s dreary yet cozy Ohio winter? 7/10.