Opinion editor's note: Star Tribune Opinion publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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Dear winter,

I am a huge fan. Come November, when the trees are barren and summer fun is long behind, you are what I look forward to. My skis wait at the ready, snowshoes are laced up for silent treks in snow-covered pines, and the much-anticipated first fat flakes set the scene. Who doesn't get a little excited for that first whopping blizzard, secretly hoping for a big snow day (though I guess those aren't quite as much fun with the advent of "e-learning" days). But still, it's fun to watch the scrolling list of school closures. And the absolute glee when it does snow on Christmas morning. Simply Minnesota perfection.

Come January, the fun still lingers. Plunging temperatures make for good bragging rights with family and friends in warmer climes (yup, minus 25!). And we can toss hot water in the air to see it turn to steam (OK, there are times you get a little boring). But then I look at my forlorn snowshoes and step it up, seeing how far I can go and how much my thighs can take. I inhale the quality time I have on your glorious carpet of thick snow and savor the serenity of my time with you.

As February starts to wind down, spring thoughts arise, and you start to be less interesting. I walk past my snowshoes trying to muster interest, and the ski paths just don't have the same allure. I feel like I am cheating on you a little bit, with my lustful thoughts of warmer days, throwing the windows wide open, kayaking, walking in shorts and slipping on my sandals.

Seriously, March 2023 was like Groundhog Day, and my enthusiasm for you completely tanked. Even I stopped cheering when it snowed and, like most everyone around me, began to wish you would go away. Sorry, winter, at this juncture no one really wants you around, and you don't seem to be getting the hint. Time's up. Spring's waiting. But I pinkie swear that next year we'll have lots of fun again.

Catherine A. Stoch, Fort Ripley, Minn.

SHOOTINGS

Make schools harder targets

If you want to stop school shootings, the simplest thing would be to strengthen school security. Have outside doors and classroom doors with no windows or with bulletproof glass. Have bulletproof glass on ground-floor windows. Place at least one police liaison officer in each school building. Add cameras to all outside doors.

Since the Sandy Hook massacre in 2012, many schools keep all their outside doors locked, but the entryways are breakable glass like at the Nashville school. Teachers cover classroom door glass with paper and when there's a lockdown, they lock the door, turn out the lights and huddle somewhere in the classroom. However, everyone knows that 90% of classrooms in a school are going to be occupied with students. Shoot out the window in the classroom door, reach in, turn the knob, open the door and you're in a classroom full of students. Schools are not safe and school districts can make them much safer, much more quickly, than expecting the government to come up with a solution someday or never.

James Branstrom, Virginia, Minn.

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In the article "Senate chaplain issues plea for action" (March 29), House Majority Leader Steve Scalise bemoans that people are once again calling for stricter gun restrictions before "they know the facts."

Here are the facts:

A heavily armed person entered a school building with multiple legally purchased firearms.
Said person then killed six people, including three 9-year-old children.

Those are the facts. Hope that helps.

Richard Hughes, Deer River, Minn.

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In response to the killings in Nashville on the news and in the Star Tribune, let's be real. We in America are in a gun culture, one born in the Wild West. We can pray, we can try to pass gun laws, and then we can cry — again. But in the end we are trying to change a culture. With only the perception that new gun laws will be introduced, gun sales go up. Less than half of the states have gun laws that might even begin to make a difference. A singular interpretation of the Second Amendment seems to be all that is needed to guide our usual response to the ending of innocent lives.

Throw up your hands. Hopefully not, but that may be all that is left to do.

Lynn Bollman, Minneapolis

MINNESOTA VS. FLORIDA

I'll stay right here, thanks

On Monday the Star Tribune published a rather lengthy, rather vitriolic letter titled "Minnesota vs. Florida? Don't go there." In his letter the writer makes a number of disparaging remarks (most of them sourced from the right-wing Center of the American Experiment) about our governor and about the state of our state. The writer states that contrasting life here with the "thriving Sunshine State" is not a flattering comparison, and on that, I would agree. Here are some of the comparisons the writer neglected to mention in his letter: the murder rate per 100,000 in Minnesota is 3.6, in Florida, 7.8. Median household income in Minnesota is $80,441, in Florida, $59,734. Minnesota has lower child poverty rates than Florida. Overdose mortality rates in Minnesota are 19 per 100,000, in Florida, 35. Minnesota's literacy rate is also better than Florida's. I could go on with these "flattering comparison[s]," but that would likely make this the length of a commentary rather than a letter.

P.S. Pretty sure the steps our Democratic governor and Legislature are taking will further reduce and hopefully (one day) eliminate childhood poverty and will positively impact several other quality-of-life issues in Minnesota. And I'm quite certain the racist, xenophobic, misogynistic, anti-intellectual agenda that Gov. Ron DeSantis is pushing in Florida will have a negative effect on practically everything except the weather down there.

Michael Farnsworth, Minneapolis

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The writer of "Minnesota vs. Florida? Don't go there" tries to make a case about Florida being better than Minnesota. If he likes Florida so much, he should join the throngs of people from across the country, including from Minnesota, according to him, that are flooding into that state. Florida's environment is being ruined by the massive number of people there. I don't mind that a number of people leave Minnesota. It will reduce the level of traffic and the expansion of the urban area. Within a couple of decades when a large part of Florida goes underwater, many of those who moved there will probably head back to Minnesota.

Mike Floerchinger, Princeton, Minn.

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A letter in Monday's opinion section stated about Gov. Tim Walz that "his endless closures that produced no measurable medical benefit." According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, Florida had more than 87,000 deaths due to COVID. With a population of over 21 million people, that equated to 1 death per 246 people. Minnesota had almost 15,000 deaths due to COVID. With a population of 5.7 million people, that equated to 1 death per 377 people. I would say that's quite a measurable medical difference between our states. Thank you, Gov. Walz, for saving so many lives in Minnesota.

Jim Wright, Delano