Rx For NJ Winters - Move South
By Gregory J. Rummo (03/31/04)
I HAVE A good friend whose name is coincidentally the same as mine. You might say I have known him all my life. We are so much alike it is frightening. We even look alike.
Greg is a conservative guy. Married with three kids and a fourth on the way, he’s not the type to take risks. He is neither a flashy dresser nor flamboyant in his lifestyle.
But last year I started noticing some changes that made me wonder if Greg wasn’t in the beginning phase of a mid-life crisis of sorts.
The first tip-off was when he traded in his big, comfy 8-cylinder German SUV for a much smaller convertible.
“How do you expect to fit your ever-growing family into that thing?” I asked him with a look that betrayed my incredulity.
“I’m not,” he answered matter-of-factly. “That’s what the Chrysler Town and Country is for. Even if I bought a regular sedan, I still wouldn’t be able to fit the whole family in it.”
I couldn’t argue with that logic even though I wondered what an almost 50-year old was doing with a BMW 3-series ragtop.
“So why a convertible?” I continued.
“Why a convertible…at my age? Hmmmm?” He shot back with a slight edge to his voice. “Isn’t that what’s really bugging you?”
“Well, yeah—sort of—although it doesn’t bug me. I was just wondering what the thought process was behind buying a convertible now.
“It’s not what you think,” Greg said with a nervous chuckle. “Age has nothing to do with it although indirectly it is a factor.”
“Oh? How so?” I pressed.
“I have always wanted a convertible,” he explained. “But living in the northeast with the long, cold winters, it just never seemed to be worth it. But now I find as I approach 50, time just seems to fly. The winters don’t seem as long as they used to. But when they end—Oh thank God that they finally do come to an end—I just can’t wait to ride around with the top down and get some sun on my face—especially after this year’s winter. It was a doozy.”
Greg’s reaction to this past winter is not anomalous. Everyone I spoke with for this column was relieved that spring has finally arrived.
There was some real emotion out there—beyond what I would normally expect to hear from the mouths of winter-hardened New Jerseyans.
“Are you glad winter is over?” I asked the guy sitting next to me on a recent flight from Newark to Kansas City.
“Absolutely,” came the immediate reply.
“Why?” I queried further.
“Heating bills,” he snapped.
“Is that the only reason?”
“Heating bills,” he repeated with more emphasis—and shoveling snow.”
The complainers were everywhere. From the breakfast counter at the Hen’s Roost in Oakland, a frequent eatery for me and my son, to the veterinarian’s office, of all places, vitriol-laced diatribes about last winter were easily elicited.
“I moved to Gatlinburg in Tennessee,” a woman told me in the waiting room. I am sick of the winters up here.” Another chimed in: “I am moving to Ocala in Florida. I have just about had enough of winters in New Jersey.”
It was a cold winter and I don’t care what the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has to say about whether it was only the sixth or the tenth coldest winter on record. For three weeks in January, the northeast was held in the icy grip of arctic air that kept temperatures hovering in the single digits.
We all suffered. People were screaming “uncle” by February—at least I think they were screaming “uncle.” None of them poked their heads outside of their cozy, warm homes long enough for me to verify that theory.
Even my snowboard-obsessed son, who spent seven hours every Monday afternoon and evening on the slopes of Mountain Creek in Vernon admitted to me in a weak moment of candor that he was ready for the warmer weather.
“So Greg, when are you moving to Florida?” I ask innocently.
Greg just smiles. Suddenly, he’s not talking.
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