“White Winter Hymnal” (by Fleet Foxes) popped up in my music shuffle this weekend for the first time in a very long time; perhaps even as far back as the summer it first became a hipster anthem. And while I tend to be curmudgeon-y about extremely popular things, I have to admit that hearing it again reminded me why I, too, loved it before it was played to death. Specifically, I admire it for this lyric:

And Michael you would fall
And turn the white snow red as strawberries in summertime

With those two lines, I’m trudging through snow as a kid, snow sneaking down my boots, cheeks stiff and stinging, and then suddenly there are strawberries, and with them the glowing promise of sunshine and no school. (How did they manage to write about blood without the slightest bit of gore?)

As March nears its end and strawberries grow ever nearer (I’m feeling optimistic today), it seems a fitting time to say a fond farewell to the winter months. This week’s Three Things is my homage to you, Winter. Now beat it.

Winslow Homer, Fox Hunt, 1893. Oil on canvas. Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia.

Utagawa Hiroshige, Fukagawa Lumberyards, 1856, from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo. Woodblock print. Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn.

Mike + Doug Starn, alleverythingthatisyou tiotquat, 2006-2007. www.starnstudio.com

And because now that the song is stuck in my head, it should be in yours, too: