As the Wesleyan campus is blanketed in snow, it may be time to face the fact that winter is near. For some, this means hot chocolate and Christmas music. For others, it means tackling the tricky task of dressing for the weather. Global warming makes our cold days colder and our hot days hotter, with less in-between transitions (Isn’t anyone else curious where fall went?). There’s no time to slowly shift your wardrobe toward warm and cozy items when winter hits campus with this kind of shocking swiftness. After long days of bare skin, we are suddenly trudging through the chilling wind in layer after layer, just trying not to freeze.

The online fashion publication WhoWhatWear released a different post every day for the past week about various styles of coats. It’s true that winter weather encourages fantasies of cashmere capes and pea coats in every color under the sun, but these dreams also come with an ideal wardrobe bigger than my dorm room itself. How chic would I look walking to Fisk in a different coat for each day of the week? But for me and many other college kids, it’s the same jacket day after day.

For those of us trying to stay warm in style without breaking the bank, we turn to the adage “the accessories make the outfit.” For the more resourceful students here, there is no such thing as a winter or summer wardrobe, but rather key pieces that take favorite garments from season to season. Leggings under floaty dresses, sweaters and sweatshirts over short sleeves, and piles of extra scraps of chunky knits in the form of scarves, socks, gloves, and hats. Think you’re ready to leave your room for class in the morning? Think again. Reach for the nearest shawl, hood, or other ambiguous warm garment and wrap it around any exposed skin. Done! You’re a fashionable college student in the wintertime. But that’s the magic of cold weather. We can wrap ourselves in excessive bolts of fabric and we don’t even need to justify it beyond pointing to the window.

I couldn’t tell you why I ever thought it was a good idea to wear mustard-yellow tights, but I still see girls rocking colored hosiery throughout the drearier months and appreciate the breath of life given to an often-drab winter necessity. Students everywhere make do with the quirkier odds and ends of their closets to spice up the otherwise dark and heavy winter wear many feel must be worn. As a girl in a panda hat strolled past me in Exley, I was reminded of the way our senses of humor can play into the fashions that keep us warm on these chilly days. This is the only season when it’s acceptable and even deemed chic to look like a marshmallow. When the snow becomes monotonous and you think your fingers might fall off, remember the heat waves of August when all we want to do is wear as little clothing as possible and only so much creativity can go into an ensemble. Swaddled like a fashionable baby, enjoy the comfort of your favorite layers and leave the struggles of swimsuit season far behind.