Winter Mornings
The empty far lot in the morning
January 10, 2016
Everyday, we are forced to crawl out of our warm beds into a world of intense freezing cold air and dark skies. We grab our coffee, and go out to our freezing cars. Still half asleep, we scrape the layer of frost off the windows and turn the heat onto full blast. The drive to school is several minutes of excruciating cold. Sitting in the car, every breath is a cloud of steam as our frozen hands click through the radio only to hear commercials on every station. Just as we turn into the close or far parking lot, our car heat starts to feel warm.
After parking, we sit in our cars until we force ourselves to make the bitter walk across the parking lot to school. For those of us that park in far, we have the luxury of an extra five minutes in the freezing cold. The walk from the far parking lot feels like forever, with every step a gust of icy wind piercing our half asleep faces. We are bundled up in our scarves and coats, but even still, nothing can stop the wind from engulfing our entire body. When we reach school, expecting warmth, we are only greeted by more coldness. We take off our puffy jackets, our gloves, and our hats and shove them into our lockers for the time being. The rest of the day we sit in the freezing school, where it is so cold that all we want to do is be back bundled up in our beds.
Everyday I see people on the walk to school from far and generally the only words spoken are, “it’s so cold”. But, I asked Junior Kate Farrell about her thoughts on the walk from far and she said, “I don’t understand why the student parking lot is so far away especially because of how cold it gets.” I have even heard students discuss the idea of creating a shuttle that would bring students from far to school, to avoid the extremely cold walk.
Many students enjoy the cold weather, for it is part of being a New Englander, while others know it leads to fun weekends filled with skiing. However, some students desire warmth, and enjoy having feeling in their finger tips and the ability to be outside for more than five minutes. I asked Junior Elizabeth Croteau about her thoughts regarding the current temperature outside and she responded with, “Well, I like the cold because it makes it more cozy when I’m inside, I also love skiing”. I guess having such drastic weather can be a good thing. Hingham High students and students all across New England certainly know how to deal with all types of weather and aren’t really phased by the extreme weather changes that happen within the course of one week. Last year, Hingham received 115 inches of snow, so we should expect anything this winter. Luckily, although it may seem far away, there is only about seventy days left until the first day of spring!
