The better midpoint

Auckland temperatures this evening.

A couple weeks ago we hit the midpoint of 2019, which is some sort of thing. Maybe not important, necessarily, but a marker of time all the same. In this part of the world we’re about to hit another midpoint, one that matters quite a lot to some of us: Tonight we pass the midpoint of winter.

As I’ve mentioned many times, in this part of the world the beginning os the seasons are taken as being on the first day of the month of their start, and not on the equinoxes or solstices that happen some three weeks later. Because our system makes the dates a known thing without variation, it’s easy to calculate what the midpoint of a season is, and the midpoint of winter is midnight tonight.

We know this because June, July, and August have a combined total of 92 days, and that means that the midpoint is 46 days—July 16 (the 30 days of June plus the first 16 of July). And once we pass midnight, we’re officially in the second half of winter.

This winter has been pretty mild, all things considered. It was unusually dry (and often extremely mild) during the first part, and it’s only been in the past couple weeks that we’ve had out typical rainy weather (and more storms are predicted for tonight). But, a few chilly mornings notwithstanding, it hasn’t been terribly cold so far. This evening we hit a low (screenshot of the weather App on my phone at right) of 10 degrees (which is 50F). It feels a bit colder than that due to how damp it is after days and days of rain, however, other winters have been far worse.

Even so, I’ll be glad when winter’s over because I like the warm months. This is actually an odd thing: After more than 23 years here I’ve fully acclimatised to winter here, feeling really cold in Auckland when the temperatures are what in Chicago I may have thought were warm. On the other hand, I like the heat of summer, and while Kiwis are complaining about how “hot” it is, I think the temperature is perfect. What makes this even more odd is that I know Auckland summers are considerably cooler than Chicago summers, and I wouldn’t mind them being warmer.

So I’ve thought lately that maybe it has nothing to do with acclimatisation to Auckland, and it’s just that I don’t tolerate cool temperatures as much as I used to. I’ve always been told that older people feel the cold more—maybe I’m just old before my time? Dunno, but I’m certainly cold before my time.

So here we are, poised to enter the second half of winter. I know it’s entirely possible that the weather—and temperatures—could very well get much worse before the it all gets better, but even if it does become worse, at least we’re slowly moving back toward the warmer months. For me, that makes it easier to endure.

Tonight we hit the point where there are only 46 days left in winter. That midpoint matters quite a lot to one of us.