I was looking through some old columns this past weekend as I prepare to buy a new computer and came across one about the crazy weather we have in Louisiana.
It was about a day I was running around the house trying to get ready for a lunchtime Christmas get together with cousins. I was breaking a sweat trying to figure out what to wear. I even turned on the air conditioner and the ceiling fan. I finally gave up because blue jeans were out of the question as I looked out the foggy windows at the dreary warm day. I tossed on a dress and flats then headed out.
On my 16 mile drive north to my old childhood countryside, I noticed a dark wall of clouds in the sky heading in my direction. Leaves began to stir in the grassy ditches whipping into my open sunroof. And before I knew it a cold gust of wind dipped into my car, giving me a chill. I looked down at my dashboard and could not believe my eyes. When I had cranked up my car it was 81 degrees and in 15 short minutes it had dropped to 63 degrees.
I hurriedly closed the sunroof and hit my seat warmer. Yes, the seat warmer that was blowing air conditioning. Wind whipped causing branches to wave back and forth. Leaves fell in droves across the small country road and cold rain pelted my windshield. I was suddenly freezing cold. And I had to think to myself, "Only in Louisiana." How can the temperature drop twenty degrees in as many minutes?
It was like literally a wall of cold air was barreling across the south. An actual wall. Not just slow layers trickling into the atmosphere. I have struggled with allergies and sinus issues my entire life and firmly believe it has to do with our warm winters that seem to be as fickle as a lady, hence "Mother Nature." We check our cell phones each morning to see how to dress and yet that’s still no help. There is a low of 43 degrees and a high of 75. How does one dress in these Louisiana winters? Layers. The dreaded season when jackets pile a mile high in lost and found at the schools because children shed them midday.
In the south we can run the air conditioning one day and the heater the next. The sustained warmth of our southern region only becomes disrupted in short-lived waves that temporarily ice things down then moves further south to eventually warm up.
Weather is woven into our lives as it likely is in all other parts of the country. We all check the radar for those days an umbrella will be needed, or fog advisories may require an earlier departure time to head to work. But up north the cold hits and remains as does the warmth in the lower tip of Florida. In Louisiana we get the melting pot of it all swirling around within a matter of days.
I have always said I prefer to live where there are seasons. And sometimes we can experience them interchangeably throughout the year, but the north can keep the blizzards. The west can keep the parched deserts. The equator can keep the rain forests while the ladies of Louisiana manage a seasonal closet with moving parts. The heavy sweaters for the occasional ice storms, the light ones for late fall and early spring. The button down ones for the days in between. And the shorts from the bottom shelf to the top and then down again. If it is one thing we master with our Louisiana weather is a well-stocked medicine cabinet and the mastery of flexibility. Next week's temperature is a low of 41 degrees and a high of 79.
