Snow or sun? How spring turns us all into sociopaths
SEASONAL Affective Disorder (SAD) is usually associated with the depths of a particular season – most commonly winter – but it can strike in between seasons, too.
Don’t you just hate it when the weather can’t make up its mind? In the past few weeks we’ve had scorchers and freezers, usually depending on which side of the road you’re walking on, bright or shady.
Sun comes out, jumper comes off. Sun slips behind a cloud, jumper goes on. The heating revs up and down, swallowing money. And I’m not sure whether I should be drinking whisky or, as is more appropriate for spring, beer.
I could never hate England – some days it feels like it’s all I’ve got – but I am impatient with it. I’ve been known to shout at it: “Why can’t you choose between cold or hot?”
Instead, Britain plays tricks. Book a holiday for April and when you return someone will say: “Oh, we had a beautiful two weeks while you were away. Not a cloud in the sky.” And what’s predicted now that you’re back? Flash floods and a volcanic eruption. Every nation’s weather has personality. Ours is misanthropic.
There is one upside. The other day I padded early into the bathroom and found a wasp crawling on the floor, near death. Ha! Down the lavatory it went. A quick Google revealed that in colder months, wasps are fooled by artificial heating in houses into thinking it is time to wake up.
But when they crawl out of their vile nests and fly smack into the cold, their metabolism slows and they become like zombies. In fact, the reduced heart rate probably extends their life – but it also leaves them vulnerable to a heartless flushing.
And that, there, is the story of a quixotic English spring. Its inability to decide whether it wants to be winter or summer turns us into sociopaths.