Dear President Dunn,
My coccyx hurts. Normally this isn’t how you begin a letter, complaining about a pain in the rear, but it is because of this pain that I feel compelled to write this to you.
The controversy surrounding the student consensus of “we should have had a snow day,” on Tuesday Jan. 28 is in the past. Nevertheless, it is an experience that transcends to today’s incident involving my coccyx.
Yesterday, WMU News issued a cold weather warning advising students to take appropriate precautions (such as wearing suitable clothing) and to use the Bronco Transit and Kalamazoo Metro Transit system. Taking this advice I wore two pairs of gloves, and several other layers as I made the four block walk to the bus stop. There, I waited for over half an hour while wind and blowing snow beat my aptly-covered body. The bus was late and as fellow students would inform one another, was late all day long.
When I finally got to my class, I took off my gloves to see the bright reddish-pink hue my fingers had turned. My fingers were beginning to swell as the heat returned to them and I had to remove my rings before they became embedded in my flesh. If you’ve never experienced frostnip, I can assure you it is quite painful.
I woke up Wednesday, Jan. 29, with a fresh attitude and can-do spirit. I bundled up, strapped on my boots on and headed for the bus, which mercifully was on time.
I got off of the bus at Rood Hall drop-off and immediately noted the conditions of the walkways. While they were cleared, it also looked as though WMU had taken the zamboni from Lawson Arena and put a shine to every sidewalk on campus.
Walking between Wood Hall and Dunbar like a penguin crossing the Arctic tundra, I hit a patch of ice the wind had buffed to a high shine and landed square on my butt. It was embarrassing, but I decided it would be best to just get up and shake it off. Problem was, it wouldn’t shake.
No matter how much I stretched or tried to forget it, there was still a pain in my butt. This snow, this ice, this weather is a pain in my butt.
It’s not your fault that there’s this much snow, that the weather is bad, that the student body is harboring resentment of a snow day that should have been- there’s nothing you can do to fix any of this, and I wouldn’t ask you to try to do so.
I can however, plead for the student body, for the sake of my frostbitten hand and my bruised rear end (and ego) that you review the quantifying reasons for a snow day, and pair them with the qualitative reality that we’re facing.
Take care of the icy mess that is currently the campus. Salt is not just a condiment for bland food, gravel is not only used for gardening. If students are to safely make it to class they need to be able to walk to class and not do an impression of slapstick comedy.
This winter in which we are currently entrenched is unprecedented. The circumstances that surround this year are different from previous years. The amount of snow that has fallen on Kalamazoo hasn’t been seen in over 10 years. Furthermore, the temperatures and wind chills have been record breaking. Just because the sidewalks and roads around campus are cleared of snow, it does not mean that they are safe for students to traverse.
Don’t be afraid to be different. WMU, in my opinion, is better than being part of the status quo- we row a different boat. I truly feel that WMU cares about its students and has their best interests at heart, even if that isn’t the message that is always clear. Administrators, like parents, aren’t perfect and can sometimes make decisions that hurt their kids.
Sincerely,
Jax Anger
Newsletter/ Opinion Editor
Western Herald,
Western Michigan University
