Here in Georgia, we’re bracing for our third weekend in a row with potential frozen precipitation. Two Sundays ago, we had weird snow showers that had more accumulation to the south than to the north, and last weekend, we dealt with a crippling ice storm that canceled church services and school days. This weekend, we’ve got more snow coming, but it’s the fluffy, fun kind.
Add to all of this bitterly cold temperatures, with lows in the teens. This adds up to weather that we Southerners don’t care for — and do complain about.
Southerners complaining about the winter weather brings out the typical chorus of smug Yankees (I say this affectionately — mostly), making fun of us for not enjoying the cold. One of those is my colleague Dave Manney, who wrote:
I hear you complaining about your brutal winters, when the thermometer dips to a frosty 25ºF. Bless your hearts, as y’all might say.
You bundle up, wearing parkas for what we’d call a lovely spring day up here. I hate to share truth with y’all, but let me tell you: If you think that’s cold, you have another think coming.
I’m talking real cold, the kind that bites back, freezes your eyelashes, turning every chore into a survival test. Please pull up a chair (hopefully nothing too frozen), and let’s break this down. You’re about to read some hard truths — as well as some not quite so traumatic, because why not?
As a Southerner, statements like these don’t sit quite right with me. So, to reclaim and remix our Southern phrase that Dave borrowed, bless y’all’s Yankee hearts. I’m about to tell it like it is.
Please know that this is not aimed directly at Dave, who is a really nice guy, but it’s for all those smug Northerners who say things like, “You Southerners don’t know ‘real’ cold.”
Here’s some hard truth from a Southerner: We. Don’t. Care.
Yes, I can acknowledge that you Yankees are so tough for braving the cold. I get it. But we Southerners don’t need your approval to dislike the cold weather.
Flashback to Why We Loathe Winter: Atlanta’s ‘Snowpocalypse’: 10 Years Ago This Weekend
We Southerners are warm-blooded by nature. We’re built for green leaves and grass, flowers, pollen, and mosquitoes. There’s a reason why the Masters is the premier golf tournament in the world — because it takes place in the paradise of Augusta National at the peak time of year.
We love our azaleas, our dogwoods, our tall trees that sway in a summer storm. We Southerners prize comfort, community, and practicality. We don’t act like it’s noble to suffer, especially in the cold weather.
Sure, here in the South, we might complain about the heat, but we know that we’re never far from a pool, a lake, a beach, or a river. And we’re eternally grateful for the glorious gift of air conditioning. The heat gives us little more than a “fiddle-dee-dee” complaint.
Northerners unravel in Southern summer heat and humidity. We don’t write smug essays about that because it would be dumb — and because nobody owes us toughness points. Every region has its nemesis.
I’m sure Northerners will complain if it gets hot up there this summer. We will, too, but we won’t write pieces that say, “Hey, y’all up North, you don’t know real heat and humidity.”
So, Yankees, we’re not asking you to stop loving winter. We’re just not going to join the cult. We’ll complain about the cold and suffer through it because we know that springtime is coming, and that’s when the South will shine like it always does.
Southerners don’t need Northern approval to hate the cold — and we don’t need elite media approval to tell the truth, either.
At PJ Media VIP, we call it like it is, without smug lectures or performative suffering. If you appreciate plainspoken commentary, a little humor, and a lot of common sense, now’s the time to join.
Get 60% off a PJ Media VIP membership with the promo code FIGHT.
Winter won’t last forever — but good writing should.
