doc w/ Pen

I quickly snapped this picture while walking to the hospital this morning.

In Chicago, where I spent most of my life, “winter” means having to dig your car out from a mountain of snow and bundling up against sub-zero windchills. In New York, I’ve seen people wearing down jackets and gloves when the temperature plummets to *gasp* 50 degrees. When I see these people, I chuckle to myself.

“Wimps,” I whisper under my breath. “They think this is cold?”

But finally, today, we got a real winter day in New York City. It’s been snowing for hours now, with several inches predicted. And it’s coming down pretty hard, even by this Chicagoan’s lofty standards.

For perhaps the third time this winter (not counting the days I spent with my family in Chicago over Christmas), I donned my long, down coat. For the first time this year, I tugged on my heavy snow boots. (And was reminded just how heavy they are.)

As I trudged down the slick sidewalk toward the hospital, I wondered how those people who wore parkas in 50-degree weather were doing. I hoped they were surviving. I thought about how ridiculous all this thick, winter garb looks on everyone, but how no one cares (or laughs) because we’re all just trying to stay warm.

In New York, some people attempt to fight the snow with an umbrella. I took this picture to prove it.

And then I saw the umbrella.

Yes, the umbrella. I’d forgotten about the umbrella.

Different cultures handle adversity in different ways. New York City definitely qualifies as a separate culture. It’s practically a foreign country. And as I was reminded today, some New Yorkers handle the adversity of blowing snow by shielding themselves with umbrellas.

When confronted with this fact, I did exactly what I’d told myself we don’t do in winter: laugh at how people were coping with the weather. It just looks so ridiculous. This is not rain, people! It’s not falling straight down. It’s not even falling sideways. In this wicked wind, it’s swirling and blowing in every possible direction. The only way to truly protect yourself from being pelted is to hail a taxi. And lord knows how rush hour traffic in Manhattan is when it snows.

This is the thing about New York, though. Walking these streets, you see a little bit of everything. Everything from a woman wearing a turkey stuffed animal on her head to a guy strolling down the sidewalk in shiny-cotton-candy-pink spandex to commuters hiding under umbrellas in the falling snow. Sometimes you’ll stare, laugh, or shake your head. Sometimes another person stares, laughs, or shakes their head at you, because they think you’re the weird one. Somehow the city survives on this invisible undercurrent of understanding that we’re all a little weird, all a little different, and that’s ok. It’s actually pretty cool. Even if you carry an umbrella in the snow.