Yes, we know. We know!
None of it is real, this simulation of cider-worthy weather enveloping Tampa Bay like a silky cloth. Florida may indeed be experiencing what online jokesters have taken to calling false fall. Unreal autumn. An October error that will evaporate before we’ve broken out our single stale sweater.
Shh, baby doll, shut your precious piehole. Please don’t explain weather phenomena to us as if we are new around here, for we are battle-tested soldiers of sunburns and chafing.
We do not need anyone to remind us that a sneaky, humidity-free respite usually blows in around this time, grinning like a problematic love interest in a romantic comedy. We know this cold front is essentially a handsome dermatologist named Tad hiding a sordid past and chronic attachment issues. We know Tad will abandon us, heartbroken and wearing his old scarf, for a bartender named Lola.
Do not utter the word “nor’easter” in our presence. Do not remind us that we are still in an active hurricane season. Do not open your phone’s weather app and remark that temps are creeping up as the week continues. Meme-makers of the world, let us marinate in our brief and glorious delusion.
Floridians need this discretionary self deception as a bridge to escape our sweaty summer trauma. We need to sit on a vinyl stool and not slide off. We need to cut down to one daily deodorant application. We need to wear socks again.
If you come looking for us:
We will be nursing a hot pumpkin latte at the edge of the St. Petersburg Pier, staring out at the cloudless skies and crystalline water and thinking, “Maybe I will write my memoirs after all.”
We will be hiking through Hillsborough River State Park, daring the cowardly mosquitoes to come for us, tasty triceps safely covered in a lightweight muslin overshirt.
We will be romanticizing things that have no business being romanticized, like the roofs of downtown Tampa parking garages, the smell of U.S. Highway 19, retention ponds in the middle of lollipop communities.
We will be acting insufferable on every main street with a gift boutique in the greater region. Safety Harbor, Dunedin, Tarpon Springs and New Port Richey will hate to see us coming with our stupid little fashion hats and smug dispositions.
We will be pushing a jogging stroller down the scenic sidewalks of Westchase. Do we live in Westchase? Do we know how to jog? Do we have a toddler? Irrelevant, next question.
We will be picking out pumpkins on cutesy fall excursions at Starkey Market, boldly believing those gourds will not collapse in a pile of goo or become deadly projectiles in tropical winds. We will silence the doomsayers as we breathe in thermal freedom. As long as false fall lasts, we will take it as the gospel truth.
Stephanie Hayes is a columnist for the Tampa Bay Times.