Midwesterners love to push it when it comes to weather. The first sign of the sun, even if the temp is still in the negatives, we’re unzipping our cargo pants to turn them into cargo shorts. We’re calling our friends to invite them over for beers on the porch. We’re going to the beach and attempting a polar bear plunge. Because we’re built different. 

We’re so beaten down by our punishing weather that we learn to relish the good days. It’s like intermittent fasting so you can really enjoy your one meal of the day. Or eating all the cereal from the Lucky Charms so you can save the marshmallows for the end. It’s a balance of pleasure and pain that is built into the Midwesterner’s DNA. Try as you might, you can’t tell us not to wear flip-flops the second it gets above 35. It’s just part of our culture. You wouldn’t try and stop Italians from eating pasta.