I am a winter girl through and through (or at least fall; I love autumn). People always jump to say it's because I snowboard and summer is downtime for us or accuse me of being a traitor to my summer birthday, but I just think it's the worst season. A weekend at the beach is not enough to stop my complaining about having to suffer through the other 100-whatever days. If any of this offends you, good. Go sit by a window and suffer.
1. It's hot. Gross.
I don't like the heat. I'd rather be a little too cold than a little too warm. I cheerfully sat at a Hopkins lacrosse game in March with a softshell on at a balmy 50 degrees. I'm pretty sure most of the students around us were too drunk to notice the temperature, but I cheered my own college's team on when there was still snow on the ground. But call me crazy because I purposely hit the slopes one night when the wind chill put it in the negatives just to see if I could. You can put more layers on when you're cold but you can't always take another one off if it's hot.
2. If there's anything worse than heat, it's humidity.
My family used to vacation in the desert when I was a kid. I could handle dry heat, but wet heat is the worst. You feel like you're swimming through the air, yet it's socially unacceptable to wear a bikini walking through parking lots.
3. Your car is a furnace. And can kill you.
I refuse to crack my windows at home because I park near a bush full of yellow jackets (we'll get to that in a few bullet points) so you can feel the 180 degree air hit you in the face when you open the door. Not only does it make me sweat and mess up my hair (getting to those too), but the minutes I have to wait for the AC to kick on are dreadful. Yeah whatever, I'm a walking #fwp.
4. Sweating. Ruins everything. Also keeps you alive.
Is it a small price to pay for not overheating and dying? Maybe. But like, it messes up my outfit. Why even wear dry clean only in the summer? Or white. Don't wear white unless you have some great detergent for those pit stains. Best way to avoid this is wearing shirts that have a very low cut armhole. I recommend living in lax pinnies.
5. My hair. Which is the most important thing in my world.
I didn't care about my bird's nest in middle school, but as a teenager, I was painfully aware it was a mess and I didn't know about the proper products. This led to being teased constantly because of puffiness that traveled into the next zip code. So I'm a little insane about my hair and weather conditions. Anyone who knows me knows this is a blatant under-exaggeration. Heat and humidity ruin all good hairstyles, especially if you have frizz-prone hair. This also causes neurotic, and not as covert as you think, checks in windows and side mirrors and avoidance of getting in a pool or even close enough to get splashed. Various styles of buns are your friend. Also enough mousse or gel to choke a moose.
6. Keeping your makeup on your face.
Don't laugh. Ladies know what I mean; gentlemen, you don't understand but your sister/girlfriend/mom can explain how irritating it is when you sweat the tiniest bit and all of your carefully laid bronzer and expensive foundation meanders downwards like a waterslide. Smeared eyeliner is a bad look whether you're crying, drunk, or sweaty. No one likes being a raccoon. I went to another tournament over the weekend and slept maybe six hours between two nights. Still, there was no way I was going out in public barefaced and looking like a zombie.
7. The unpredictability of summer storms.
It will always be when you leave your windows open or you're at an event with an outside venue. You'll be caught outside without an umbrella and suddenly you're soaked: clothes plastered to you, squishing shoes, and hair unfixable. The only thing less predictable than if and when you'll get a storm is whether the temperature and humidity will actually go down afterwards.
8. Sunburns burn like... well.
It is true you're supposed to wear sunscreen when you're on the slopes or shoveling the driveway. I don't because I don't even bother to put it on during the season where the sun hits our area more directly. Every summer I get burned at least once and then I'll put sunscreen on the next day. I'm the kind of person to do the same thing over and over again on the chance that the results will differ that one time.
9. Bugs are alive.
One of the great things about winter is they're either dead or hibernating. Then it gets warm and out comes the wasps, ticks, mosquitoes, flies, etc. I'm still mad about that time right before high school where I got stung on the hand picking berries and had to walk a mile and a half home. Bonus points for poison ivy growing too.
10. Treacherous beaches.
Beaches seem like lots of fun, until you consider the probability of getting sunburned, the possibility of drowning, and jellyfish. Every time I go, it's two out of three. Every time.
11. Longer days means people want to do more stuff.
If you're antisocial or even just an introvert, it's even harder to get people to go away and give you some peace when it's light out 14 hours a day and you can just do all the stuff!
12. Realizing you're a grown up and summer break doesn't exist anymore.
For over a decade of your life, you're indoctrinated into collating summer with months off to do whatever you want. Then you graduate and enter the real world to the shocking revelation that it is no more and you will most likely work the whole year straight through. Summer, this is your fault.
