Winter is (Coming) Here.

Elena Tucker
3 min readJan 14, 2024
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

I was watching the dark, heavy, slate-gray clouds beginning to boil over the view to the west of Denver, over the Rocky Mountains, when I felt that familiar prickling of happy tears. It was the return of euphoric joy, what I and about 2 to 3 percent of the population have when inclement weather rolls in — the opposite of Seasonal Affect Disorder (SAD) otherwise known as nSAD.

OK, full disclosure, I’ve only read one article that called it that particular thing, and I could never find this nSAD again, but I liked it so much, I’ve used it ever since. Can’t find the source of the term since.

This euphoria is my response to the weather prophets’ forecast for the next three days: today’s high is a mere 11 degrees Fahrenheit (which is coincidently about -11 degree Celsius), and tonight’s low of -6. Sunday’s high is 10 degrees, low of -2, Then Monday’s high is 2 degrees, low of -6 with a 70% chance of snow. Tuesday we’re going up to a balmy 31 degrees for the high (which is still wonderfully below the temperature water freezes). So, it makes sense that it looks like Canada’s frosty weather is moving in for a few days.

I know this is dangerous weather. I get it. But I am incapable of feeling anything but happiness in my dark, and cold cold heart. It is my biology. Like Jessica Rabbit, who is not bad, but is just drawn that way, it is just how I am made. (If

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Elena Tucker

Writer and storyteller, immigrant, wife, mom, knitter, collector of jokes, lover of cheap, sweet wine.