Apricity

a vocab word that happens a lot in Colorado

This actually happens quite frequently here in Colorado: in fact, Winter is usually much sunnier than Spring, for us. Apricity is a very normal state of things in this … state. Ahem.

The fact that there’s a special word for this phenomenon (sun in winter) suggests that it’s a weird thing, but not for me, nor is the opposite at all unusual. Colorado, and often especially my hometown of Boulder, has the weirdest, most erratic weather you can think of—any ‘typical’ way of having a season just doesn’t happen here.

Unfortunately, I missed the boat of taking a pic of my immediate environment back when it was warm-sunny Winter, but I do have examples of what I’d call the opposite of Apricity: heavy snow in Spring. Which is also quite common here. So, if apricity means warm sun in winter, then what would you call deep snow in spring? Cipracity? (No, please do not look up the actual meteorological term for this: I don’t want to know, unless it’s whimsically similar to apricity.)

There’s a saying here in Colorado: Don’t like the weather? Wait 10 minutes. Think that’s surely exaggerated for humor? Nope, not so much. It can be cold in winter but it’s more often hiking weather, not a White Christmas. It gets hot here in the summer, but it also rains pretty regularly in June. Our most gnarly blizzards happen in March and April, hence the below image.

The view from my bedroom window, 3/14/24; the first day of Spring Break (unofficially, since it’s a snow day and the kids had the day off because of… well, this).

A Midsummer Night’s Rainstorm

When I used to work at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, the out of town folk would be amazed that I’d grown up in Boulder. It was a tourist attraction to them, especially the East-coast folks. One NYU student turned to me, astonished, after telling him I grew up here, “No. You *go* to Shangri-La; it’s not your hometown. You make a journey, a pilgrimage, to El Dorado; it’s not where you went to elementary school.” 

Yeah, welp. /shrug/

But their awestruck outrage did make me appreciate my all-too-familiar surroundings a bit more: each summer when I hung out with the CSF peeps, I found myself looking up at the Flatirons much more frequently than my usual habit, and I enjoyed my favorite cafes and bars that much more immediately when I had a n00b with me seeing them for the first time.

Of course, the Colorado Shakespeare Festival was and is an outdoor event: ‘Shakespeare under the stars,’ they call it. And I’d be asked what kinds of clothes should be worn on any given day. I never had an answer—even having grown up there and still living there at the time, I never knew what to wear either. Layers, was the most useful advice I could come up with. But even that didn’t help much.

Rehearsals for CSF spanned the month of May, and when we were forced to practice outside on the open stage, it was brutally hot to a dangerous degree once the stage was freshly painted black for the season. Performances go through June and July on the weekends in the evening, and were often rained on if not rained out.

Same with RenFaire: my job there was to perform (or at least appear in) 9 fights plus a parade each day of the Faire, with 10 minutes allowed before each to rehearse and 10 minutes after to drink a sip of water; the rest of the day (between 10am and 6pm) spent walking around the site and improv-ing. One year, I dressed in men’s clothing, which consisted of a long sleeved pirate shirt, black trousers, tall boots, a velvet doublet, and of course my leather sword gloves and sword in its belt and sheath. The following year, it was: corset, long underskirt, outer skirt of velvet, bloomers and tights, and of course the gloves, belt, sword. Every day on site was blazing hot, unless it poured rain (a rare enough occasion but no less difficult to maneuver in those clothes). So I’m used to being uncomfortable in Colorado weather of all kinds, if you think about it. 

The velvet here is dark green. You can see my utility belt, from which my mug and gloves are hanging, and the sword belt under that. And yes, bangs. Don’t judge me–this was 1998.

The worse for (outer)wear

So, how *does* one dress properly for Colorado? How did I dress regularly, growing up? Well, we have to take the time period as well as the weather into account.

We teenagers would wear no hats in winter because of our ‘80s sprayed fashions of hair. Or? Alternatively, we’d spray our hair over and around a hat, which would be chosen for fashion, not protection. But a winter hat just to stay warm (or a bike helmet for any reason)? Heck no. Incidentally, remember the silk scarf layer framing the face, from under a pillbox hat, fashion? No? Just me?

For a long time, my winter (and Fall, such as it was) outerwear consisted of a black trenchcoat and fingerless gloves. And silk long johns—can we bring those back?

In summer, we became goths in hot weather. Also remember: back in the day, we goths would cover up, too: we would never have any skin showing, certainly no tattoos, and piercings wouldn’t really become a thing till the ‘90s. Speaking of:

In the ’90s: we’d combat chafing in shorts under our dresses, or sweat in jeans under those dresses. And scarves in all seasons. But hey, if you think about it, it’s all layers: perfect for Colorado.

I still do this, by the way. I’ve got several recurring faves from the ‘90s and even late ‘80s that I still rock (I’ve talked about these briefly in Textures, but here’s some more): shorts, bloomers, or leggings/pants under mini dresses? Love it. An extra large men’s sweater over a lace or satin camisole? Nearly every day. High/platform/chunky heeled boots? Which pair you want—I’ve got several. Fishnets or torn or patterned or cut stockings? Totally. Except one ‘80s thing I can’t stand is pantyhose. It’s funny—once I started wearing stockings, especially with a garter belt to hold them up, my mom was like: why?? We had a conversation about it, and I averred that I found pantyhose to be so uncomfortable, while for her the invention meant freedom of movement to a large degree. When she was growing up, after all, girls were required to wear skirts to school, and there were no light small garter belts or easy pantyhose, but big tight girdles with huge metal clips that would be uncomfortable to sit on all day. And if she had her period? Pads back then had belts too, not the vastly more comfortable adhesive kind we have today (let alone tampons). With all this, they’d be hot in summer and freeze their knees off in winter. But then, she grew up in Illinois, not Colorado—even more extreme weather? Maybe.

Fa fa fa fa fashion

Fashion (as does most if not all art genres in general) encompasses all styles these days. Nothing is really out of style, or old fashioned in a bad way, and thank goodness: since at the moment I’m wearing a sundress over lace-edged bike shorts and doc marten boots with a man’s hoodie over that. And a lace scarf. Yesterday I wore an oversized linen button-down shot through with gold thread, and Vans, and a leather collar and cuff. And a very long braid. But I’ve got a high undercut and multiple tattoos now, one’s even a sleeve: much more daring than my young self ever had the balls for, even if I was dying my hair black back then.

If my 16 year old self could see me now, she’d be ecstatic. She’d also be horrified that I take my clothes off in public, and would not understand my career in choreographing violence. But she has a similar artistic aesthetic to mine, so we could have some conversations, especially about Tolkien and goth fashion and good bookstores. She’d also be very happily surprised that my partner ended up so hot in his middle age, that he still writes the cleverest limericks, and that we’re not just friends, but partnered together. So yanno. We change and we also stay the same. In snow and sun.