There’s no warm, dry and cozy way to say it: This winter has been cold and wet and miserable across Alaska.

People will talk about the winter for years to come, but not in fondness. More of a “I survived it” memory — with a plea, “my back still hurts from shoveling.”

Memories include the roughly three feet of snow that fell on Wrangell, followed by rain that turned streets and sidewalks, parking lots and driveways into ice, which made for slipping and sliding and griping that nothing was gripping.

Or the memory that as of Jan. 10, almost 100 inches of snow had dumped on Juneau the past few weeks, prompting avalanche warnings downtown and evacuation orders, along with collapsed roofs and flooded streets as heavy rains started to turn snow into rivers of melted slush.

Or maybe it’s the record-setting snowfall of almost 20 inches that covered Anchorage on Jan. 5-6, followed by minus 18 and minus 19 temperatures, then more snow over the weekend, covering what the plows and shovels had just managed to clear. Police received more than 200 calls over the worst two days, including five crashes with injuries.

A runway at Anchorage airport had to close temporarily, just as the Juneau airport closed for a night last month when the snowfall overwhelmed the plow drivers and their equipment.

Some people will remember the 18 days with lows temperatures colder than 40 below in Fairbanks the past several weeks, making even hardy Alaskans turn up the heat and hope for this week’s forecast of a warming trend to the 10s and 20s below zero.

Businesses airfreighted more snow shovels into Juneau and Angerman’s restocked ice cleats in Wrangell.

Contractors were quoting Juneau homeowners several thousand dollars to clear snow from a roof — that’s when a homeowner could even find a contractor with an opening.

The City and Borough of Juneau and the American Red Cross established overnight shelters for people who decided it would be safer not to sleep in their home in an avalanche zone. The Nugget Mall and Fred Meyer closed over worries about the snowload on their roofs.

Everyone has stories they will remember about how they managed through the worst winter in years. It’s almost a badge of honor for Alaskans to retell of harsh weather.

Most people, however, probably would be happier to know it will end in a month or so and not come back. One worst-winter-in-years memory is enough to last a lifetime.