“What good is the 
warmth of summer 
without the cold of winter
to give it sweetness.”
John Steinbeck

What an amazing difference six months can make. In July 2025, Kathy and I enjoyed a pleasant visit to Bristol, Rhode Island to spend a few days with our friends, Steve and Karen Aveson. Steve and I were high school classmates. They have a beautiful home, with a cozy guest cottage, in the heart of Bristol. While we were there, we were privileged to witness the historic Independence Day parade. The 4th of July celebration in Bristol is the oldest continuous Independence Day event in the nation, active for over two centuries.

While the parade was quite entertaining, I noted that one of the strategies for truly enjoying the experience was to find a place in the shade to watch the parade pass by. It was hot and humid in Bristol in July. That was then.

Now, six months later, it’s a bit cooler in The Ocean State. The low this morning was 1º. (That’s not a typo!) The high in Bristol today will reach only 26º. With the wind blowing between 10 and 16 miles per hour, the wind chill factor, a term with which Californians are not at all familiar, will make it feel even colder.

While I am incredibly grateful for our visit to Bristol in July, and for the warm hospitality offered to us by Steve and Karen, I am, perhaps, even more grateful to be in San José today, where the morning low was a cool, but mild 46º, and today’s high is predicted to be a comfortable 63º. I cannot begin to imagine what it would be like to go out for an afternoon stroll in Bristol today.

The San Francisco Bay Area has a few summer days each year that could be described as hot. And we have a few days each winter that we might claim are cold. In reality, most Californians have not experienced the extremes of summer and winter which grip other parts of the country annually. And I think it’s safe to say that we can’t even imagine what it must be like to experience these things.

Steinbeck’s words ring true. It is the cold of winter which enables us to truly appreciate the warmth of summer.