The cruellest month

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 08/02/2022 (1506 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Back in 2016, Kevin Killeen, a humour novelist and reporter for KMOX, a radio station in St. Louis, Mo., released a report on February. “February is the worst month of the year, but it’s an honest month,” he begins. “It’s a month that doesn’t hold up life any better than it really is.”

The video resurfaces every February, but this year it has really exploded on social media — and for good reason. It is the funniest seasonal story I have ever seen. I love everything about it, from the deadpan, Norm Macdonald-esque delivery to the shout-out to Sad Desk Chili. It also contains my new favourite line of all time — “the desperate flinging off of something that’s not true anymore” — about a floral-print umbrella that someone has chucked in a garbage can. That line is a treasure that belongs in a Weakerthans song.

He’s wrong, though.

February is not the worst month of the year, at least not in Winnipeg. It’s not even close. The shortest month cannot also be the worst month. The fact that one of the winter months is only 28 days feels like some kind of benevolent gift.

Besides, February in Winnipeg is when winter gets good — and not just because of Festival du Voyageur. The days are getting longer; the sun — which we still get here in winter — actually feels warm on your face.

Reliably, there’s the February Thaw, a shot of spring-like weather that serves as a reminder that everything is temporary.

You can actually be outside in February; when people say they “love winter,” I’m convinced they are talking about this cute little 28-day bridge between the icy depths of January and the temperamental nature of March.

Sometimes, February has 29 days, and that’s because February is exceptional.

No, the worst month of the year in Winnipeg is April. I used to think that the armpits of the year were January and November, but no, they are April and November. See, January understands the assignment. January, I would submit, is the real honest month: it knows it is the Monday of the year. April doesn’t know what it is, and has therefore decided to be November.

In most places, April is Actual Spring, not Diet Winter, with blossoming trees and cheery tulips popping up in gardens. Here, tulips bloom in June. Here, April is demoralizing. Here, April is road salt and garbage and that One Nice Day in which Winnipeggers prematurely put on shorts and say “Wow, it’s so nice out” to each other when it’s merely OK out.

No. It’s not nice out. This is just the lie we tell ourselves.

There’s an argument to be made that the worst month of the year is March, which usually comes in like a lion, and goes out like a bigger, angrier lion. But March is when my birthday is, and also the first day of spring, which feels like hope. April is like “Ha, ha, ha, just kidding, here’s a flood.”

To be fair, April in Winnipeg looks a lot like February in St. Louis — the February of Killeen’s video. Watching him navigate a colourless world made me realize how lucky we are to have both sunshine and snow, the real MVP of winter.

Yes, it’s a pain to shovel — especially this year; there is no more room for snow — and if enough snowflakes band together they can close an airport, but look: would you rather have depressing brown grass or a sparkly blanket of powder that makes everything new again? Even if you don’t partake in winter sports, you can still enjoy walking through Narnia. A bit of snow can transform a salt-stained street and skeletal trees into a magical postcard.

Of course — of course! — it snows in April, but it’s not the kind that hides our sins and turns everything into a marshmallow world. Instead, it’s driving grains of precipitation that are neither raindrops or snowflakes, just shards of ice headed toward your eyeballs, punishing you for putting out your patio furniture before May long. Snow in February is expected, welcome even. Snow in April is a crime.

There is a Scandinavian saying that there’s no bad weather, only bad clothing. I suppose, then, there are no bad months, just bad attitudes. Except, obviously, for April.

jen.zoratti@winnipegfreepress.com

Twitter: @JenZoratti