THE BREAKUP OF A HARD WINTER.

THE BREAKUP OF A HARD WINTER. The father of a friend of mine was born in rural Ontario sometime around the beginning of the twentieth century. My friend had picked up some phrases from his father just as I have some phrases that date to the Midwest of a century ago. One was to use the phrase “just fair” to mean God awful, as in “That hotel was just fair.” The other phrase was “like the breakup of a hard winter,” as in “The car had gone through a lot and was beat up; it looked like the breakup of a hard winter.” Now that we are into the mud and patchiness of March thaws, people in the Northeast can imagine the breakup of a hard winter in Ontario.