I’m on it. I checked.

In March, spring is slated to arrive on time. The sun will cross the equator around March 20, heralding the arrival of the new season.

Do you have your doubts?

Last year, it took more than a month for spring to remember its agreement, but it’s like this every year: life becomes a giant ketchup commercial, as we sit in anticipation of spring actually stepping up to the plate. It is the most rebellious of seasons.

I remember volunteering for a Girl Scout camping trip for my daughter’s troop. They set the date for June 15th, and I spent the night in a tent in six layers of clothes, cursing the spring and believing it should be banished altogether. We’d be a lot happier if we believed winter turned to summer without a buffer season. Every nice day thrown our way in May would feel like a gift from winter instead of evidence that spring went missing.

Spring fails us almost every year. Nothing that has been ranked so consistently a failure is still so coveted. We’re much too nice to spring.

And after this winter? Spring has a public relations problem on its hands.

This hasn’t been whimsical snow-globe weather. It’s been muscular. One storm stacked on another with barely a thaw between them. Weeks of sub-zero wind chills. Polar air dropping south like it owned the place. Airports shut down. Highways erased. Schools exhausting snow days before February had the decency to end.

Buffalo and our region did what Buffalo does — lake-effect bands parked themselves overhead and refused to budge. There were days when the sky turned solid white and the plows simply could not keep up. Drifts swallowed cars whole. Roofs groaned under the weight. People dug out elderly neighbors twice in the same week. Even seasoned residents admitted this one felt different — longer, meaner, less forgiving.

And then Providence was buried under forty inches of snow last week. Forty. Not over the course of a storybook winter — but in a single relentless stretch. Heavy, wet, back-breaking snow. The kind that snaps branches, bows power lines, and turns shoveling into a full-body workout you didn’t sign up for. Plows ran in rotating shifts and still fell behind. Side streets narrowed into icy corridors. Roof rakes sold out. You could hear the midnight thud of snow sliding off pitched roofs like distant avalanches.

Meteorologists ran out of adjectives. “Historic” began to feel routine. In some regions, seasonal snowfall totals were flirting with records before March even arrived. Wind chills dipped low enough to make exposed skin sting within minutes. Parents layered children like astronauts just to get them to the bus stop — assuming school wasn’t canceled again.

We are over the layers. Over the scraping. Over the daily negotiation with black ice. Every errand feels like preparation for an expedition. You don’t “run out” anymore — you calculate. Is it worth the boots? The gloves? The windshield ritual? We have memorized the sound of the furnace kicking on. We know the weather app like a toxic ex. Another alert. Another warning. Another “significant event.” Enough already. The snowbanks are no longer charming; they are territorial walls. The sky has been gray so long it feels personal. If spring wants forgiveness, it can start by showing up.

So yes, spring is “slated” to arrive on time. On paper.

My husband says that when he retires, he’s done with Northeast winters for good. He’s not a fan of Florida, so I’ve come to believe the place he envisions us living out our golden years doesn’t actually exist. I picture us driving around the country one day, trying to match his inner postcard with reality.

The best places to retire change every year, which has more to do with marketing than meteorology. Some lists still point to affordable cold-weather cities like Fargo or Pittsburgh. Others highlight Southeastern growth spots. Florida, once the obvious answer, has grown staggeringly expensive in many of its most popular areas. No income tax, yes — but rising housing and property costs have reshuffled the math.

But here’s the quiet truth: plenty of retirees move south, buy the dream house, and a few months later pack up and move home again. They miss their grandchildren. They miss old friends. They miss the rhythm of real seasons — even the rebellious ones.

Some of them move back to the snow and head straight to the hardware store to replace their shovel.

I keep telling my husband there’s more to life than sunshine. I’m wondering if that’s true.