For the record, Marrakech did get cold this winter. It nearly reached freezing temperatures a few nights in January. (I know, New Englanders and Midwesterners. I know. But people here barely flinch when the temperatures soar into the 110-degree zone, and correct me if I'm wrong, but haven't Bostonians historically considered three consecutive days of 90-degree weather a heat wave?)
Weather acclimations aside, it really felt for a few weeks as though I had packed an entirely wrong set of clothes when I came here. Summer dresses? What was I thinking? Despite the memories I retain of the heat that could strike a man down if he stood outside in the sun too long, it felt like the cold wouldn't go away. And when you live in a concrete block meant to keep the heat outside and the cold inside, when you work in an open-air building, you feel the cold deep inside you, all day.
So when the weather turns again, and the temperatures creep gently back to more pleasant levels for outdoor living, it feels like a small miracle.
Even though this turn happens every year.
Even though you know the winter will end, you're still surprised when it does. You ask yourself how it can be that you have forgotten the truth of the seasons's turn, but don't blame yourself. It's the human condition to forget what we know to be true when the reality of our everyday lives contradicts what we know is coming.
I do this every year, you know. I forget that spring is coming. I think that winter is all that there ever will be. And then, slowly, agonizingly, comes summer. But that's how it is in New England. This year, in this place, spring caught me unawares. She laughed and kicked out the cold while I was sleeping off a bout of the flu my students gave me. I woke up and found the trees were budding and the temperatures were enjoyable enough to leave the balcony doors open once again.
Your spring is coming. Weather-wise and life-wise. If there's anything I believe, it's that the winter does not--cannot--last forever.
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