Lauren wakes up with the bright sunlight shining in her eyes. It’s 11:00 a.m. and she panics a little thinking that she overslept and is late for school. Suddenly, she remembers that today is a rare occasion in the east coast state of North Carolina, a snow day! There’s almost a foot of snow outside, and she lays back in bed and quickly falls asleep.
Illinois may be one of the few states in the United States that has frequent ‘snow days’, but states such as California, North Carolina, and Virginia are not as lucky.
“If we’re lucky, we get two snow days a year, at most,” Lauren Ray, North Carolina high school student explains. “The delays are more frequent because the ice/snow generally melts pretty quickly here, versus where you are (Chicago) the snow seems to take AGES to melt.”
The weather in warmer states ever barely reach below 5°F. Many people who live on one of the two coasts have never even seen snow! In Chicago during the winter, people who live here can almost always point out the ‘tourists’ or ‘out of towners’ because they’re bundled up in boots, winter coats, and heavy pants, even when its only 45°F outside.
“It was weird coming from Chicago where we had up to six or seven snow days a year, to Virginia where it’s almost unthinkable to cancel school because of snow,”said Natalie Farrey, a Virginia high school freshman.
On the off chance that the schools out East experience a snow day, most people end up staying indoors because the roads are too bad to drive on. They can’t even go build snowmen because no one has the proper attire to withstand the cold weather.
“We normally get a huge group together and just hang out and watch movies,” Ray said. “Normally, my dad and I go downstairs to the coffee shop and stock up on hot chocolate.”
For California, a state on the opposite side of the country, the phrase ‘school is cancelled because of snow’ is almost unheard of. Schools there are surprised that it’s even possible to have so much snow that school gets cancelled.
“School would only get cancelled here if there was some sort of deadly disease, severe storms, bomb threats or a gas leak. I think if there was even a few inches the whole county would freak out. We don’t have anything to even clear the snow away,” said Shannon Smith, a mom in California.
In the winter the state only gets to about mid 50s in daytime at its coldest and low 30s middle of night. Compared to the record shattering low Chicago-area temperatures of -20°F, the coasts are almost like a spring day.
Sometimes it seems there is one perk to living one of the coldest cities in the country: snow days.