Spring Aesthetics


Spring is here and after our break, everyone’s more concerned with how they can mentally check out until Summer while still maintaining their grades than the season itself. In all honesty, it’s a filler season that pales in comparison to the anchor seasons before and after it. The problem is that Spring isn’t hated like Winter, or loved like Summer and Fall. Another culprit in everybody’s apathy toward the rainy season is New England’s ‘interesting’ nature fluctuations which gives Spring a reputation of unreliable weather (we’re talking about shorts on Monday and a puffer coat on Friday). But to pay tribute to this forgotten season, I’ve compiled yet another list of aesthetics that both give Spring its due credit for ending Winter and being an opening act to the end of everyone’s school-related misery.


Media

Books are always more aesthetically pleasing when you don’t feel as if you’re wasting time indoors(the productivity may not be there but the delusion is).


It Ends With Us and Daisy Jones and the Six

Aesthetic: It’s not quite time for an all out Summer romance binge, so you might as well add a little bit of sadness in your reading lineup for spice. Similar to how the latter part of Spring has the sunny vibes of Summer (just with more work and less sleep), these books seem happy enough until they crush and kind of put you back together.

Aesthetic Rating: 15/10

Reasoning: Sure flowers and tragic love stories mixed with Spring get a reputation of being basic, but for Lily Bloom, Daisy Jones, and their respective (sort of problematic) love interests? We’ll make an exception.

 

Malibu Rising

Aesthetic: You want it to be warmer and summer. Honestly? I understand you.

Aesthetic Rating: 8/10

Reasoning: Some may say a book set surf and beachside screams summer more than spring but hey, we need an option for our delusional people who wore shorts on that first day when it was only 65 degrees outside. If they can believe that it’s 10 degrees warmer than it actually is, so can we.


Pride and Prejudice (2005) and Emma (2020)-Movie Edition

Aesthetic: Pretending that you’d be content without actual rights in exchange for pretty dresses, galas, and guys that have an actual vocabulary.

Aesthetic Rating: 13/10

Reasoning: Two of the many pieces of film guilty of romanticizing the rain and in April – it’s definitely needed. It’s probably my own bias speaking, but seriously, if you’ve managed to make it through the school year without watching a historical form of media on repeat, congratulations! You are normal.


Better Than the Movies (Book) and 10 Things I Hate About You (Movie)

Aesthetic: Nothing better than a book about a girl who loves rom-coms and a rom-com about a girl who hates them to be the perfect spring, full circle, meta match.

Aesthetic Rating: 500/10

Reasoning: We love a good mild, normal (and by normal I mean not trying to kill each other) enemies to lovers trope.


Activities 

I know when you think of Spring activities either a really random walk in the park comes to mind (always somehow involving flowers), or nothing at all. Just remember that it’s the last time until Fall that you’ll be able to go outside without feeling like something is burning you alive (yay!)


Getting Annoyed by Insects

Aesthetic: Getting reminded that mosquitoes exist every 6 months is so unbelievably humbling, it comes with the realization that you’ve romanticized the warm weather a little too much in your head.

Aesthetic Rating: 11/10

Reasoning: We have the birds, we have the bees, and we have about every other thing that comes out for the first time since fall. It’s a mutually toxic relationship and we both hate each other, but for some reason they keep on bothering us and we keep going outside (No, the fact that technically the outdoors is their home doesn’t make it better).


Allergies

Aesthetic: Finally being able to go outside without catching a cold then getting a stuffy nose from a literal flower.

Aesthetic Rating: 11/10

Reasoning: I think that we can all agree that while the weather and clothing may not be consistent in spring, everyone at one time or another will face the underwhelming foe of allergies. Whether you have accepted it or think that your eyes watering constantly is normal, we all take part in this annual pain-fest no one talks about. Well, no one brings it up until after they keep sneezing in a Covid-conscious environment and clarify(to avoid the dirty stares) that they don’t have the infamous virus, only that they are allergic to pollen.

Buying Yourself Flowers

Aesthetic: It’s cheap enough, they’re for sale, and they smell nice.

Aesthetic Rating: 7.5/10

Reasoning: Everyone has had the intrusive thought to buy random pretty flowers, but no one seems to act on that urge. They figure that it’s reserved solely for funerals or husbands who need to buy something cheap but endearing enough to act in place of a real apology, but it’s totally not– so go to your local Trader Joes and break the floral glass ceiling.


Going to a Picnic

Aesthetic: You found a Pinterest board of aesthetic things to do in Spring, but quickly have realized that ants trying to get in your chips is not your idea of ‘aesthetic’. I’m not looking to feed an ant family, I just want to feed myself.

Aesthetic Rating: 4/10

Reasoning: Simply based on the question, do people still do this anymore? If I brought a blanket to a park and started eating out of a wicker basket, would people think I’m weird or aesthetic?

Spring-itus

Aesthetic: Watching any motivation you have left melt away once it’s seventy degrees out (for a single day, but still).

Aesthetic Rating: 2/10

Reasoning: You’ve heard of Senioritis, and trust me, the rest of the Warde population deeply sympathizes. However, while the Seniors have less than a month left in the school year, Freshmen, Sophomores and Juniors alike have to suffer for another two months(ish). Somehow, the warmer it gets, the more the work seems optional (or at least statistically more grating). There must be some science behind it. I’d ask the AP Biology or Chemistry students to figure it out, but they’re burnt out and studying for their AP tests (yikes).


AP Tests

Aesthetic: Abruptly realizing that you actually have to take the 3 hour test you signed up for in 2 weeks and subsequently spending all your time thinking about them instead of studying.

Aesthetic Rating: -1/10

Reasoning: At this point, you’re either still rushing to finish up the remaining units or reviewing content . Either way,the panic is setting in. Regardless of which point you are at in the preparation process, AP students are united by the fact that we’ll all be watching Youtube videos summarizing course content the night before.
The only reason its rating is not lower on the negative number scale is because at least after 8 months of torture, we can be finished with our classes a month early. Plus, the test grades come out in July. At least if we fail, we can find out under the sun. Preferably by the beach.

 

Conclusion

As the year is coming to a close (scarily fast), it’s important to take a moment to smell the roses, but only if you have $7.49 to buy some calamine lotion from CVS to treat your inevitable bee sting. We also need to somehow stop Spring from gaslighting a whole generation into thinking it should not be over 60 degrees at the end of April. You can’t give us two eighty degree days of sun and then drop it down to sixty degrees.

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