I’m ready to shave my legs again.

Do you hear that, Winter? I acquiesce: It turns out I actually can care about something, and I’m ready to make myself presentable again.

Do you understand the level of despair I felt last weekend seeing eighteen inches of fresh snow gathered upon the ten inches of permafrost that was already on my balcony? I can only imagine it was akin to what Anna Karenina felt before she threw herself in front of a train. Can I say that with any certainty because I’ve read the novel? No! Anna Karenina is freaking long, and if you haven’t been keeping up with the times, attention spans are no longer a thing.

Which brings me back to your relentless march of drudgery. I’m over it! We all are! We GET IT: You took it easy on us for several years, and the line, “Winter is coming,” floated around in our cultural zeitgeist for an inordinate amount of time and you needed to shut us up, but enough already. This winter has been the kind that finally makes me understand how a character in a Victorian novel could be in the flush of health, catch a cold, and cease to exist three months later. Do you know what it’s like to see a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and immediately ask, “HOW?” And have this be an introduction to the longer question of, “. . . IS SHE ALIVE?” I have on more than one occasion caught a stranger staring at me in horrific rapture, and in my younger days would have confused this with an opportunity to be flattered. But I am much older and wiser now, even if my sagacity has not grown in proportion to my status as an elder. Nevertheless, the truth I have learned is that these strangers are concerned for my literal life. “Is she on the brink of death?” Yes! BRAIN DEATH! FROZEN. BRAIN. DEATH! Jack Torrance has my deepest sympathies, Stephen King didn’t know SHIT! Someone is going to get MURDERED! And it is going to be me!

So please. Please please please. You’ve had your time to shine. Take a bow. You’ve done great. Believe me, we will not be forgetting you.