Dear Spring
(Or, The Annual Hate Letter)

Here we are. Again.

You know how I feel about you. And yet, you persist in coming around, like clockwork, every year, totally disregarding my feelings.

I hate you.

It's hard, you know, to hate you. You're the popular kid, the one everyone waits for, and waits for, and waits for. March is like the Casablanca of months. Under their woolen scarves, people mutter and moan, "When, oh when, is spring coming?" "I can't wait for spring." "I love Spring."

Feeble-minded fools, I say! A few daffodils and a ridiculous burst of dogwood blossoms -- is that all it takes? Don't you know that spring takes your energy away? Ancient Koreans knew better. They knew that fall was good for humans -- a time when the earth gave up its harvest, giving it over to humanity for increased energy. But then spring comes around, six months later, and robs it from us, using it to put on manic displays of bloom -- sometimes only for a day or two, mindless of the waste!

A warm breeze against your winter-pale arms, hidden for 5 months under jackets and sweaters -- are you really that easy? Don't you know that spring is false, and will quickly leave you dissipated and ruined, like a rake in a Victorian novel? The comfortable night temperatures, warm enough to walk around without a jacket but cool enough not to inspire perspiration -- they'll leave soon enough, and then what will you have? Uh huh. Hot, humid, punishing summer. (Which, with the frigid air conditioning that Americans love so much, opens the door to sickness and ill health -- but that's for another rant.)

The falseness? Oh, don't tell me you don't know. Fine. Let me tell you once again -- spring is a lying, deceitful silver-tongued charmer. Rebirth? Only to die in six months, kiddies! A false hope, spring brings, casting a spell that lulls the mind into thinking, "Oh, look at the pretty flowers! And the birds chirping! Life is a bowl of genetically engineered seedless cherries! All is well with the world!" when really, the flowers (unless they're perennials, which do spring back into life every year) will die, the birds will fly away, and no genetically engineered seedless cherries, as of yet, exist. Autumn keeps it real, people. Autumn says, "Look, we all die. See all these trees and shrubs and shit? Leaves are shriveling up and dying and dropping to the ground to become that mushy wet mess that smells a little funky. But hey. We can all go out with a bang. Check out the colors of my forests. Blaze o' glory, dudes. Rock hard before the lights go out."

Oh, spring is not your friend, friends. And yet, you persist in welcoming it, greeting it with smiles, pastel colors, and flip-flops. You huddle in your tiny restaurant "patios," seated at which you "get" to breathe the exhaust of passing cars. Bah! Fie on spring and you, with your delusional optimism and hope! Go ahead and be happy! You'll find out soon enough what a fickle pea-brain that spring is!
(207/730)