March of the Mosquitoes

This week-after-break's sunshine has been nothing short of distressing.   Where are my overcast March days, spent in the productive indoors applying for summer internships?   Where is that freezing rain I so welcome when mid-semester essays pile up?   Where's all the treacherous end-of-winter road slush when all I want to do is ride that bike I forgot at home over break?

Exploring NYC (compared to Canton it's another country!) over break.

Disappointments, all around.   My lack of a bicycle is probably the most serious disappointment in the list above, although my grand total of one internship application completed this week (thanks so much, sunshine) is a close second.   It's been tough sitting on a beach towel, finishing my spring break this week.  So tough I've had to resort to asking friends for Northstar Cafe iced mochas to help me push through.

I heard a group of boys declaring this past Monday “summer dress day” at SLU.  Summer dress day, I asked myself?   Here at St. Lawrence, where it is so rarely summer, the summer dress is a sundress: a comfortable, bright colored thing worn—you guessed it—any day with a greater proportion of sunshine than ice.  Sundress Day, then, is the unofficial start of warm weather, impromptu quad Frisbee, and spring concert season, although with an almost Groundhog Day ambiguity as it could (and has, sophomore year) snowed up until graduation.

One last trip to Appleton Arena for the SLU and community skating club performance.

A final disappointment in the sudden switch to sundress season for which neither my toenails nor my workload was prepared is the arrival of mosquitoes.  There haven’t been many, as it’s still too chilly for the lazier buggers to wake up, but the most aggressive and daring “career mosquitoes” (Hunger Games, anyone?) have been out in full fury. I can’t say my ankles are pleased. 

Almost at the door for the Hunger Games' midnight premiere!

I was sitting on my KDS porch last night, enjoying the warmth and batting at mosquitoes, when the same friend I published in my “Farewell Ropeswing” post composed a pretty tribute to this time of year.  I love how this anonymous swimmer/science star/recreational poet somehow gets the feeling just right:

I went to pick a flower
But there were none in bloom
Because it is still March
And not July or June.

And then I picked a tree
But it was far too tall
Next came a leaf, so small and brown
But soggy since the fall.

And so I picked a bug
A mosquito: friendly, true
And sent her toward your legs and arms
With kisses, me to you.

Distance group love at my last swim meet of the year (it's over already??).

Enjoy my interspersed photos of my past few weeks, and, as always, thank you for reading!