Is Dartmouth getting hotter or colder? Does the number on the thermometer even matter to the students? Southern belle-turned-New Englander Jean Ellen Cowgill explores the ins and outs of the weather and whether or not it keeps Dartmouth students bundled up.
Before I came to college, my mother was determined I would be prepared. By "prepared," I do not mean that she showed any concern for the possible rigors of Dartmouth's academics or social life. In those arenas, I was on my own. No, my fudge-making, Kentucky-bourbon-ball-loving, southern-"i"-pronouncing mother poured all her anxiety into my new choice of latitude. She might not have been able to shield me from the difficulties of term papers or pong, but, by God, she would shield me from the New Hampshire cold.
I arrived freshman fall saddled with hand warmers, several new coats, and long underwear. Being the grateful child that I am, I called her the first week to complain: why had I let her convince me to pack fewer skirts to make room for fleece, and what exactly did she expect me to wear for the first few months, when the high was currently 75?
"Dressing for the weather" seems like a completely straightforward process -- you look outside, maybe check Weather.com if you are feeling a little more compulsive, and grab sunglasses, umbrella or hat as needed. But how much of our response to weather is based on assumptions about general climate, past experiences or expectations?
"I know last week, in Florida, everyone was completely bundled, including myself, because the high had dropped below 50," said Daisy Freund '08. "Now I'm in the same temperature here, but because there's snow on the ground, 45 feels pretty warm. So I'm in a lightweight top. But my clothes in both places seemed logical at the time." So how much of the weather is in our heads?
Now, Dartmouth can be cold. I think we can agree on this point. But if you are from a state south of Ohio, you receive infinitely more street cred by way of this fact than, I'm guessing, if you are from Canada. In my southern friends' minds, Dartmouth is a snow-covered winter wasteland. The fact that I have not yet succumbed to frostbite, nor died of starvation for refusing to leave my room for food, is, to them, a major accomplishment (though still a silly endeavor that I could have avoided by lodging south of the Mason-Dixon line). Not sounding like a familiar line of reasoning to you Montanans and Coloradans? I didn't think so. You've seen worse? Yes, you've told me so before.
As the temperature began to drop freshman year and calls to my mother shifted from complaints to cries for help ("NO ONE told me it got DARK here at 3:30. This is DEPRESSING"), I attributed Dartmouth students' various responses to changing weather to this homeland difference. The kids still playing Frisbee on the Green in t-shirts whilst I pulled out the parka? Must be international students from Russia. The kids wearing long underwear on the random days when the high rose back to 45? Pour souls, must be from sunny lands without seasons. Others seemed to concur with this line of reasoning: "Oh, she's just used to it. She's from Toronto, Denver, the Balkans, Siberia."
Then I met Tess Reeder. Tess is from Dallas. This was supposed to place her squarely in the "damn I've never seen negative temperatures" category. She was supposed to wear long johns. She was supposed to be cold.
But no, freshman winter Tess silently mocked my "Southern Blood" arguments in her thin, wispy skirts -- paired with Uggs, but still. Let's recall, this was before the "leggings" movement that hit Dartmouth my junior fall, and before the thick stockings now gracing the windows of the Hanover Gap. Whole feet of Tess' legs were exposed. I was completely baffled. When you asked her how, or why, she simply shrugged -- "I like skirts." Well, yes, so do I, Tess, but it's, like, -15 degrees outside and you are making your southern compatriots look like wimps.
Tess, I now realize, was employing the willful "I'll pretend I'm home" approach to Dartmouth weather. She isn't the only one. "I wear flip-flops as long as humanly possible," said Sarah Herringer '08, from the San Francisco area. Because that's what I did every day at home and it's what I'm used to." Sarah introduced me to distaste for Dartmouth weather I hadn't even considered--Dartmouth summer. "I hate the summer here. It's not supposed to rain when it's warm. It's just not."
Even those from seemingly "cold climates" can be tricked by New England precipitation patterns. "We like to think we're a cold climate because there's all this snow, but it's always sunny, so we're really not," said Lily Macartney '08 from outside Denver. "It just doesn't compare. So we come in [to New England] and like to think we can take it and, circa mid January, layers start flying on. And hats."
Any '09 reading this and recalling their freshman winter probably thinks of me and Lily as pretty big wimps -- but that winter was one of the warmest on record, to the disappointment of skiers and snowman-builders. And, to be honest, although I did not yearn for the -29 degree days of my freshman year, I missed the snow too -- seeing a snow sculpture in the middle of an otherwise very green Green just did not seem right.
Maybe that is how all Dartmouth students deal with the cold. Although I may wear four layers while you doggedly persist in flipflops, we eventually accept the cold, the rain, the mud and the snow (albeit relcutantly) as part of our Dartmouth experience -- and with it, the layers, the complaining, the water in the boots, and the bragging rights.
After all, after you survive a true Hanover winter, you get to go off on your winter internship and scoff haughtily at the DC police helping pedestrians cross the street, with little torches showing the path, after a snowfall of four inches. It's fun. And on such winter off terms, it's refreshing to return for Carnival and see a big white rabbit surrounded by lots of white Green. It feels like home.
Who knows what this winter will bring. Cancellation of classes due to snow (gasp) like last year? A green Winter Carnival like the year before? As I write this, the high is 60. Surveying Collis, those who checked the weather report are in skirts (Hi ,Tess), rain boots and lightweight jackets; those who didn't wear down parkas and Uggs. I suppose whatever weather we see in the coming months, we are prepared for what we consider "hot" and "cold." My mother would be proud.
