Sometimes I wake up and wonder if I'm having a heart attack.
This thought quickly dissolves when I realize my breathing is normal and my head is on top of my left arm, cutting off the circulation. Despite being awake, my arm is still "asleep."
Everyone who's felt the familiar tingling sensation of an asleep limb knows that to regain feeling, all that's necessary is a little repositioning and stretching.
Much like with an asleep arm, I sometimes wake up on a winter morning and feel like I'm going to die. To be affronted, as we were last month, with a foot of snow just a few weeks before Spring Break leaves me feeling hopeless and with no feeling in my feet as I trudge to class.
The winter season is synonymous as a time of depression and incessant sleepiness, giving rise to the idea of seasonal affective disorder, the acronym for which is, appropriately, SAD. Symptoms include social withdrawal and sugar/starch cravings. Winter's shorter daylight hours can discombobulate the body's clock, emphasizing pessimistic feelings or attitudes.
Fortunately, a warmer climate has begun to appear. Rather than snow dusting campus, the rain soaks it. T-shirts and umbrellas will eventually become more common than Uggs and gloves. Students won't have to worry about slipping on icy sidewalks. That alone will make everyone a little happier.
After Spring Break, students (and faculty, I imagine) find it much more difficult to return to class and continue studying. Everyone is aware that there aren't any more breaks until summer, and in the two months between now and the end of the school year, students can find themselves self-destructing, bemoaning their final papers, final projects and Finals Week.
One reprieve students have from bare, white-walled classrooms and textbook assignments is the weather itself. The change of climate understandably affects our mood and temperament.
Writing for Psychology Today, Jay Dixit explains, "Sunshine makes us nicer, inducing us to want to help others. On sunny days, regardless of the temperature, we answer more survey questions from people with clipboards and tip more generously."
On warmer afternoons, people spend more time outside, soaking up the vitamin D. Students eat outside, more people ride their bikes and the Quad is a popular napping ground. Those not confined to the residence halls can grill without the threat of frostbite. People find their frisbees, skateboards and footballs and take advantage of the after-class afternoons.
We will literally and figuratively stretch our limbs, rising from vegetative states to pursue the outdoors.
Matt Soniak of Mental Floss magazine explains the physiology of why our arms and legs unexpectedly go to sleep: "We've got nerves running through our bodies that act as lines of communication between the brain and the other body parts, transmitting commands from the brain and relaying sensory information back to it for processing. What's happening with a sleeping limb is that your nerves are going a little haywire because prolonged pressure has actually cut off communication between that limb and the brain."
The temperamental nerves in our bodies will transmit more positively, boosted by the (impending) spring and summer seasons.
After being confined primarily indoors for the last few months, we can comfortably venture outside once more. The daylight is lasting longer. There are more bikes on the racks outside and more people are jogging down McKinley Avenue. Spring is creeping onto campus, slowly but surely.
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