Love it or Hate it: Fall Heat

Two Flyby staff writers weigh in on Harvard's unseasonably warm fall thus far.

Love It: “Why Are You Complaining? Winter is Terrible” by Stuti Telidevara

To say the warm weather is too warm is shortsighted. In a few months it’ll be so cold that your knuckles will hurt from the force of the blistering winds. Your lips will be permanently chapped. Your face will go numb ducking between Sever and Emerson. Do you enjoy the ten minutes of thawing you’ll have to do when entering a heated building in the winter (and the indoor overheating)? That’s what’s ahead of us. The Farmer’s Almanac says this winter is going to be much colder than last year’s, and super “wet and snowy.” No, thank you.

Compare that to the current blessed weather-utopia we’re living in. It’s pleasantly warm for your morning commute, hot in the afternoon (when, let’s be honest, everyone is usually in a building anyway), and it cools down pretty dramatically when the sun sets. That means shorts! Skirts! Birks without socks! Flip flops! Crocs, if you’re one of those people! Even more importantly: when you go out at night in ~revealing~ clothes, you don’t have to tote your monstrosity of a winter coat and worry about someone stealing it at a party. And you can actually wear aforementioned ~revealing~ clothes without losing sensation in your limbs. You want to wear sweaters? By March, you’ll be sick of them, because they’re going to be all you’re wearing.

Clothes aside, it’s so great to actually be able to feel sunlight on my face. The sun sets by 4 p.m. in the winter, and I basically have the productivity of a sloth after that. I walk out of afternoon section and into some kind of dark underworld. None of that now, though. I can actually see the colors of the sunset on the way to the dining hall. #instadaily

Speaking of the good ol’ outdoors, the warmth makes them actually survivable. I find myself wanting to take walks or sit on the lawn. And this is from someone with no desire to move whatsoever on a normal day. Do you know what it’s like to feel yourself falling asleep in a deck chair? Heaven. That’s what it feels like.

I know that Harvard’s population has a disproportionate number of Northeasterners. That, combined with the average student’s masochistic tendencies, makes some of you guys think the weather always has to be life-threatening. I’m here to tell you that’s not the case. Weather can be your friend too, if you just let it love you.

Hate It: “Sweater Weather is Just Objectively Better” by Trula Rael

Following a recent trek back from Central Square, I looked like I had just taken a dip in a swimming pool of sweat. And while I could attribute this excessive perspiration to my below-average fitness level, I choose instead to blame the merciless sun on that 86-degree day. I made a beeline for the lone window fan in my stuffy room, but alas, the air it was blowing in from outside was too hot to provide any respite. As I hugged the fan, visions of DeWolfe air conditioning danced in my heat-delirious head.

According to my Google calendar (which I live by) summer has come and gone. But my weather app tells another story. I enjoy summer as much as the next person, but now that the calendars are firmly turned to fall, how am I supposed to mentally (and physically) prepare myself when thermometers rocket to 85 degrees?

It’s hard enough to look semi-put together on any given day, but achieving any look is exponentially more difficult as the heat rages on. I find myself trying in vain to pull a nonrepetitive outfit out of the mere two-week supply of summer clothes I came to school with. I’ve got a giant box of sweaters gifted from my mom, her friends, and everyone’s second cousin twice-removed who was convinced that I would freeze to death. Not one well-wisher thought tank tops were in order.

One would think that in such unbearable heat, these sweaters would go sad and unused, but I’ve made that mistake once, and I won’t make it again. One minute outside renders anything long sleeve incredibly uncomfortable, but ten minutes into an air conditioned lecture in Sanders, and I deeply regret my clothing choices. When it’s cold outside, I can simply take off layers once I get inside. When it’s hot, however, the burden of lugging around layers to handle freezing cold buildings outweighs the joy of a breezy, light sundress.

So bring on the sweater weather. Bring on the boots, the leggings, the blankets and pumpkin spice flavored everything. I’m ready for the days when “warm” means cozy, not sweaty.