Wearing shorts in 40°F weather “because we can.”
WEARING SHORTS IN 40°F WEATHER “BECAUSE WE CAN.”
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Remember those crisp, biting days on campus? The kind where the cold bit through your jacket, yet there they were, or there we were, striding purposefully in shorts. It wasn’t a fashion statement or a lapse in judgment. It was something else entirely. It was an unspoken code, a quiet declaration against the relentless academic grind and the often equally relentless weather. It was a subtle act of defiance, a way to reclaim a sliver of control, to prove a point to ourselves: if we could conquer the elements in this absurd way, we could conquer anything.
This wasn't just about physical endurance. It was about mental fortitude, about that peculiar brand of institutional spirit that thrives on pushing boundaries, even seemingly silly ones. We saw it, we did it, we sometimes questioned it, but we understood it. It became a shared secret, a knowing glance between kindred spirits enduring the unique pressures of campus life. This tradition, like so many others, might seem bizarre to outsiders, but it stitched us together, creating a tapestry of shared experiences from primal screams to secret societies. What’s your "because we can" weather story? When did you embrace the cold in shorts, and why?