“April showers bring May flowers.” Right now, I find myself questioning this statement. When I hear these few words, I picture umbrellas shielding pedestrians from the rain. This saying doesn’t depict people walking down the street, using their hoods to keep the snow and freezing rain out of their faces. When most people think April and April showers, they think about spring. 

Spring is my absolute favorite time of the year. I was looking forward to the start of spring as soon as the first snowflakes hit the ground in the fall. 

Over spring break, I was hoping the warm weather would come, but the weather only got worse. When the official start of spring came on March 20, I was given a glimmer of hope that the warm weather I love would be coming. Finally, my favorite weather showed its face last week. I was able to walk around campus in a T-shirt and capris and actually be too warm. 

But I was horribly disappointed this week when I couldn’t leave my dorm building without putting on several layers of clothes and snow boots. What broke my heart even more was the fact that the weather was actually bad enough for SDSU to close down the campus for the first time in years. This unseasonable weather got me thinking about how many times spring weather has been delayed in past years. 

When I was in elementary school, I remember having a snow day on my dad’s birthday — April 7. Looking at pictures from my junior prom two years ago, no one would be able to tell that it was mid-April. I can’t tell you how many times I had people ask me how winter formal was because of those photos. The weather was so bad that night that a few of my friends’ out-of-town dates backed out on them at the last minute. A group of the senior girls that year decided to wear rain and snow boots through grand march so their toes wouldn’t freeze. 

But as hard as I try, I can’t ever think of a time when the weather was this bad. I mean, my hometown had school only two days during the week of April 7. As beautiful as the weekend weather was, I never would have imagined that Mother Nature would go so bipolar by the end of the week. 

With the meme craze that’s constantly blowing up Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest, I found one meme about the weather that makes me laugh every single time I come across it. The picture is of Drew Carey on “Whose Line is It Anyway.” Carey’s opening line for every episode stated, “Welcome to Whose Line, where the rules are made up and the points don’t matter.” The meme parodies Carey and reads, “Welcome to South Dakota, where the weather is made up and the seasons don’t matter.” That is the truest thing I’ve ever read on social media sites. 

Despite all the awful weather that’s been occurring, one thing is certain. The bad weather this week (and maybe in coming weeks) will only make us appreciate the real spring weather when it finally decides to come our way.