August Cold Snap in the South

I walked outside to grab my daughter’s water bottle out of the car.

Please someone tell me that I am not the only parent who has a graveyard of 74 sippy cups and water bottles in the back seat of my car at all times.

It’s August 16th and it was 65 degrees outside.

I walked outside and stopped. I thought I had nearly lost my mind.

‘Am I awake?’ I thought to myself.

‘Why is it so cold?’

The night before, in the swampy heat of an August Alabama night, my husband told me we were having a cold snap come through the south.

That the HIGH next week one day would be 75 degrees.

Mentally I stopped and planned out my entire day with the kids outside. I imagined a lot of activities and laughter and miniature sunburns. I couldn’t wait.

But this came the next day.

Enough to make a southerner think that Jesus must’ve come back and forgotten them.

or

Are all the conspiracy theorists right? Is the weather being manipulated?

or

Have we died? Is this heaven?

You see, living in the South there are multiple pieces of summer.

There is the summer that slowly begins by mid May. It is hot and we know that hell soon is coming.

June is when we adjust, we accept the heat but we are all just so thankful for summer and fresh veggies from the garden or the old lady down the road, that we don’t notice it.

July is when we feel the rage of the heat. We know It is there and we are already planning fall football just so we can dream of cooler temperatures.

August we are weary. We ask ourselves why we choose to live in this part of the United States region. Our sanity is compromised.

September is when we hate everything because it is indeed football season but it isn’t football weather yet. We want bonfires with our buffalo dip and football parties. We want to walk around the quad and stand in the stadium to watch warm ups but it’s just too hot.

October, it’s hit or miss, but usually we can see a light at the end of the tunnel.

SO, an august cold front? A morning in the high 60s?

What is this nonsense? Or miracle of sorts?

But I realized while I ruffled through the back seat of my car that living in this region is a place of consistency. We know what to expect from our neighbors, we know that strangers in the grocery store line will ask you about your kids, life, grandmother and who you are kin to that they may know.

We know that we cannot plan Fall weddings on Saturdays in the south - and if we do, we must provide access to watching “the game” — in Alabama, that would be who Auburn is playing and who Alabama is playing.

We know that when someone dies or has a baby that meal trains will happen and people will bring casseroles or pot roast or fried chicken “because it can stretch a few meals and is good comfort food.”

We know that finding a church is what people refer to as a “church home” or “church family”.

We know that at most gas stations in small towns there is a buffet with fried livers and gizzards and a jar bigger than your head of pickled eggs.

We know that road trips to the coast call for pulling over at the boiled peanuts or fresh veggie stands for a snack along the way.

We know that when a funeral procession happens, you pull over and make way for a family grieving.

We know that no matter how crazy the world gets, the real southerners… not nashville or Atlanta, I’m talking the REAL south will remember who they are and where they come from.

SO when there is an August Cold Snap in the south, we know that there is a Good God waiting on us in a heaven that feels just like this.