Triptych

November:

January

April

In this triptych, I wanted to examine human's relationships with nature over time.  Being a Minnesotan, weather is a huge part of our lives here when they tell us we have four seasons but really it's just two: winter and road construction.  Nevertheless, the snow is a big part of our lives.  As seen above, the first snowfall feels magical, almost as if it's that one person at a party who just livens everything up.  From my experience, I've always loved the first snowfall because it's a beautiful change of scenery as opposed the the brown, dead leaves littering the streets.  January comes and I often have mixed feelings about the weather.  On one hand I like the weather because it's beautiful and there's always a possibility of a snow day (or this year, a cold day).  But if there's no days off of school, then the driving is treacherous, crisscrossing in the street around potholes and bumpers on the roads.  As well, the cold is a bitter attribute.  But we deal with it because we're cold-blooded vikings of the north.  April comes and it feels like a drawn out experience.  Personally, I've always hated it when it snows in April because "April showers bring May flowers," but the flower won't come if they're frozen like last year.  These months aren't just literal either, they're figurative for stages of our life.  In "November", or when I was a young lad, I always loved that first snowfall, and the last.  I loved sledding down the giant hills and creating snowmen and having snowball fights with everyone at school.  Then"January", or adolescence, came along and I no longer had the same appetite for the snow.  I liked it then but not in the same way.  I always thought to myself I liked the snow but I didn't like the cold, so I stayed inside and played with my friends, away from nature.  Fast forward to "April", or young adult, and I loathe the snow much more so than I ever did.  I thought to myself that I can watch the snow on my computer away from the cold, detaching myself from nature.  As I've grown older, I've become more distant from nature, wanting this utopian nature (the sun and warmth that mimicked the indoor weather) that didn't come very often.