What A Difference A Day Will Make

At this time tomorrow, I'll be on a Southwest Airlines flight bound for Florida.  I can already tell you that my mood is going to be 1000-times better than it has been for any of the past 120-days.  That's because when we land, I know that I won't have to put on six layers of clothing just to step outside the terminal building.  People won't mistake me for an arctic explorer about to hitch up to my dog-sled team to to take on an unforgiving Mother Nature in a life-or-death battle to avoid frostbite and hypothermia just to pick up some milk at the store.

I will be greeted by this thing in the sky that we like to cal "the Sun."  We haven't seen it much around here lately.  Yes it's been out, but to venture outside to try and enjoy it has been a miserable experience for what, the last three months at least.  Down there, it will feel like a giant heat lamp, re-energizing me like the alligators that I'll see on the golf courses.

Did I mention golf?  There will be actual greens and fairways and tee boxes visible--and USABLE--not buried under a foot and a half of snow--leading some of us to wonder if we will be able to play around here before April 15th.  And I won't have to don my Under Armor Cold Gear to play a round comfortably.  I will wear out my arms and my back swinging clubs and rolling putts--instead of lifting shovelfuls of snow over piles along the driveway that threatening to bury the kids walking past to and from school each day.

In a further signal of rebellion against Old Man Winter, I've gone so far as to rent a convertible Mustang.  Give me more of that Sun--give me more of those Gulf breezes and the salty sea air as the wife and I cruise along the Oversees Highway and into the glowing sunset at Margaritaville.  It will be nice to have my prescription lenses darken because of actual bright sunlight--instead of just being so cold that it triggers the chemical reaction inside the plastic.

My poor pasty legs and arms and chest will get to see some UV rays--soaking up the Vitamin D--and proving that Brian Wilson was 100% right with everything he wrote for his fellow Beach Boys in "Warmth of the Sun".  It will almost be like a re-birth--a new shot at life, moving out of a dark, cold and dreary existence that has sapped away my "essence" for so long.

I'd send you a postcard--but that is so 20th century.  Look for the sun-splashed photos on Twitter and Facebook.  I'll be the guy with the biggest smile on the planet.