Is It the Weather or a Mental Breakdown?
I am not a meteorologist, so I can't really say.
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I recently walked to a coffee shop in the rain. It was cold, 40 degrees, and it was cloudy, not unusual for the Pacific Northwest.
If you asked me how I felt about this kind of weather before I lived in Portland, I probably would’ve raised my dirty martini as if toasting the sun and proclaimed something like, “We don’t have to worry about that in LA.” (Please also imagine me in a long, sequined evening gown. Sitting on a piano. Wearing gloves and pulling it off.)
Not that I never got cold in California. At one point, I think my body was programmed to believe 58 degrees was the temperature at which water froze. But that kind of cold is just the thermostat of warm weather being turned down.
In the PNW, the cold is a guest who moves in, using your bathroom and eating your snacks. For some, winter is like catching up with an old friend. An old friend who’s overstaying their welcome, in my opinion.
But on this day, I walked to a coffee shop because I decided I should embrace the chill. Everything else in my northern life is so lovely, so what if I don’t like the cold? It’s a good thing to know about myself - my dislike - because then I can work around it. I lived in London and Washington D.C. and walked to school in Maryland snow and I survived. I don’t like the cold. I just don’t like it. That’s not a problem. Just a fact.
By the time I was in line for coffee, my body had something to say. It felt as sudden and involuntary as being hit by food poisoning: emotional vomiting. Tears were erupting out of me, I could tell my face was crumpling like a used tissue. I’ll be the first person to encourage crying (it’s cool), but the wave of pure UPSET surprised and scared me. And everyone else in line!
Alone in the bathroom, I caught my breath and retraced my steps. Did I sleep weird? Am I lying to myself and am actually deeply unhappy? Do I just need to poop and it’s frying my brain?
After 32 years and 500,000 therapy sessions, how am I still a mystery to myself?
Over the next few weeks, I shared the story of this outburst again and again, hoping someone could see a detail that I’d missed. People I love kept offering me coats. No one disputed that I was being a brat, but everyone talked about my cold aversion like a problem that can be fixed. My friends brought me to a Good Will warehouse where I found two winter jackets and a faux fur vest for under $10 (total — which I’m convinced makes them warmer).
Being outside and cold is not as bad as being inside and clinically depressed.
So I bundled up and focused on love and leaves and audiobooks. Under my faux fur vest and jacket and sweatshirt, my armpits sweated while my face stung from the cold. Sunny days were easier for venturing out, but rain could deter me from leaving my apartment for days. I kicked myself for not adapting better. The upset from the coffee shop grew to upset about being upset. Very useful.
I’m warm, I told myself. It’s cold, but I’m warm.
Ironic, because if there’s anything I hate as much as cold weather, it’s the fake heat businesses blast in the winter. Hate is a strong word. Which is why I’m using it. Don’t even get me started on the 4:30 sunset.
To recap: I’m upset at outside, I’m upset at inside, and I’m upset at myself for the upsetness.
I’ve realized that not only do I not like the cold, I do not like that it is cold. How dare the weather be weather. How dare the seasons change.
Hasn’t enough changed, I think, tearfully looking around my Portland apartment, which still feels new even though I moved here over a year and a half ago. So many of the changes that happened since 2020 feel like they happened to me, rather than because of me. Los Angeles and the “California girl”-ness I injected into my own personality when I was younger has been part of my identity for … ever. I used to lie about where I was from, pleased when people introduced me as someone from LA, even though I grew up in Maryland. Now I haven’t lived there for going on three years and five lifetimes.
I’ve heard that our brains will do anything to avoid change, even if change is for the best. Things that have changed in my life during the last two years: where I live, who I’m with, who I love, what I do, how I spend my time, how often I see the ocean, how many books I own, my bed, my hair, my face wash, my goals, my priorities, my therapist, my body, my zip code, my opinions on professional wrestling, and … the weather.
Of course my brain needs to cling to something. It actually has adapted, more than I ever guessed would be possible. Why does my brain hide these victories from itself?
How do we move on when we’ve already moved on? How do we accept that, if you’re lucky, change is inevitable? That if we’re lucky, we feel a full range of emotions that sometimes knocks us over in line at the coffee place. That even if we’re feeling the absence of warmth in the winter, we’re lucky to feel anything at all.
