February 23, 2022

I’ve always considered the definition of a traditional February as being the month of bitter sub-zeros and too much snow. With less than a full week left of this deeply wintry month, I can report that February of 2022 has been exceedingly traditional.

With the freeze-thaw-freeze cycle we’ve been in the last week or so, I haven’t ventured outside. I have to be very careful moving when it’s snowy and icy, of course, and it just seems unnecessary to go out just for the sake of getting fresh air.

I open the front door, as well as the back one, at least twice a week. I stick my head out and I breath in, and deeply too, at least three times! That’s fresh air, and that’s my story and I’m sticking to it—at least until we get a few warmer days.

As soon as we have couple of days where the mercury climbs to forty, then of course I will open my doors and windows and air this house out. It never gets really stale in here anyway, because we do have several little places where the seals between the doors and windows of this place and the outside world are not what anyone would call airtight.

David tried to replace the weatherstripping on the back door last week, but quickly realized that it’s a project best saved for the spring. He also has proposed installing screen doors, front and back, and actually, I like that idea. Not because I think that the extra door will keep the cold out in winter, though I suppose it might help. But because I can then have the doors open to the air in the summer, but not open for the bugs to come in.

There’s nothing I hate more than when flies get in my house. And we don’t even want to mention the occasional wasp, do we? I think having screen doors will be a great way to combat that habit he has of leaving the inside door wide open. And yes, I will suggest, strongly, that the screen doors he acquires have glass that can be raised or lowered as the need arises.

Wish me luck with that one.

Our renovation in the bathroom is complete, and I am now almost exclusively using the door that opens between it and our bedroom. The new closet is still in the planning stage, and that’s fine. David will be getting to work on that soon. I’ve done my part, as I have given away nearly a half of all the clothing I had prior to this renovation. That wasn’t as hard as I had feared it would be, because I gave myself permission to keep anything I felt really attached to.

I know I didn’t do a good job of explaining myself when my husband asked me why I was so upset over his original dictate – “that you have too many clothes, and they just have to go!” Fortunately for the cause of world peace and security, my beloved will never be a member of Canada’s diplomatic corps.

As I get older, I often reflect on the days of raising kids. I used to joke that once you become a parent, you no longer have the right to own anything, because those kids were capable of breaking, borrowing, or losing anything and everything, on a regular basis. And not necessarily but also, as I get older, I feel less secure, just generally speaking.

My relationship with clothing has always been…different. While raising our kids, what money was available for clothing went to buy clothing for them. I still recall the day I was taking our middle child, the one no longer here, to the mall to buy him a pair of really good athletic shoes. They cost a mint, but he needed them. As I was walking down the mall toward the store, I was glad I was wearing slacks, because the elastic in my undies chose that moment to let go. If I’d been wearing a skirt, my undies might have hit the floor. At the time, I found it really funny that I was about to spend more than a hundred dollars on shoes for my son, when I didn’t have decent underwear for myself.

Now, I have no kids to raise, and since, oh, about the last twenty years or so, I’ve felt relatively free to ensure I have good underwear, and all manner of other necessary clothing, whatever I’ve needed and occasionally, I even felt free to buy something that was pretty, that I wanted, but didn’t necessarily need.

So, when David told me I must rid myself of most of my clothing as if it was nothing more than unnecessary flotsam and jetsam, it just kind of pissed me off.

But I went through everything that had been hanging in my closet and not worn for a long time and managed to fill three large bags for donation. And when my husband seemed pleased with my effort, I simply shrugged.

And I assured him that if I did start leaving the house again on a regular basis, my first few trips out would most likely be to buy new clothes.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 February 16, 2022

Life has a rhythm, and for the most part, that rhythm is as familiar as our own reflections. And when we can move to it, when we can function within it, it’s a blanket of comfort that covers us with a sense of security, that feeling that all’s right with the world.

The last couple of years have shaken that sense of comfort, so that we are all of us together, in this moment in time, looking for our new familiar rhythm. I don’t know about you? But I am grateful to know it’s not just me hitting discordant notes as we bump along this Covid-lined path that life since 2020 has become.

I read somewhere once that the only people who like change are wet babies. I think for the most part, that saying is true. Most of us like a little bit a programmed change, as in, “oh, let’s do that on Saturday. That will be different, and fun!” But the kind of change that makes us feel afraid and powerless? The kind of change that upsets all of our patterns, that more or less unmoors us from the security that we need? That’s tough for most of us to deal with.

Friends, we humans need constancy, and we need to know the boundaries. Once we have those boundaries, we make ourselves happy (or not) within them. We understand the norms, the rules, and we can work with them.

But when the rules and the norms change, and change and change….that’s when we have a problem. Also, because of the ease of survival in these modern times, our stamina for stressful situations is very limited.

If we’re students of history, then we know there have been times through the ages when humans had no guarantees of living even into their fifties. There were wars and famine, there were harsh living conditions. There were plagues in medieval times for which there was no cure, no vaccine, no medication, and no escape. There were no day spas to sooth the pampered souls that too many of us, in this day and age, have become.

You’ve heard the term “snowflake”? There’s a reason that is a term, and that reason is a lot of us. Has there ever been a generation alive on this planet that is more wimpy? I think not.

During my first full time job, just after David and I got married (nearly 50 years ago!) I had a co-worker who had been born in England. She told me that after a couple of years of war, the people got used to all sorts of upheaval. During those fraught years, she went to work in London, a young woman doing the best she could to do a job and live her life. One day while she was working away, an explosion happened nearby, and a lightweight light fixture fell from the ceiling above her onto the chap working across from her. And the old woman beside her didn’t even jump, she just looked over at him, slumped over as he was, and said, “he’ll be fine in a moment.”

Some would call that being tough, and some would call it being totally insensitive, but what that old woman’s behavior was, was adaptive.

During the Spanish Flu pandemic of the last century, people didn’t have the wealth of knowledge that we have now, and didn’t understand the science, which was really still in infancy. As a result, many more people died, world-wide than have died in this pandemic.

None of us can control the world around us. We can’t make our neighbors wear a mask or take the vaccine; we can’t make people see things the way we see them. Everyone has their own point of view, forms their own beliefs, and rare is the time when someone who hangs onto those beliefs with both fists can be convinced that their “truth” isn’t “truth” at all.

The only thing we can control, in fact, is ourselves, and what we do. David and I have understood as the scientists have learned more about this virus (it was called a novel coronavirus because it was brand new, after all), that what they understood about it would change, it would evolve, which also changed the knowledge of how best to deal with it. We understood that part of the equation and don’t consider that evolution to be “flip-flopping”. It’s not politics, it’s science and it evolves.

Just recently the Ontario government has announced that the restrictions are being lifted. In our opinion, they are being lifted not because the danger of infection is past, but because people have decided that we do have to learn how to live with this in our lives—since it’s not going to go away anytime soon. And they are being lifted because a sufficient number of people have cried, “enough, already!”

Therefore, for our part, we’ve decided that we’re going to limit where we go and we’ll wear our masks when we go there. We’re going to monitor the suggestions with regard to a possible fourth shot. If our local health officials say we should have it, we’re rolling up our sleeves.

And that will form the basis of our new rhythm. And since it’s not an overly complicated one, I’m sure we’ll do just fine.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 

 February 9, 2022

The Olympics are on again. It seems like just last summer that we were watching Olympic updates…..oh, wait. It was just last summer that we had the summer games on our televisions.

And now here we are again with the Winter Olympics – which is actually a kind of a throw back salute to the past.  I say kind of, because it used to be that the winter and summer Olympics were always in the same year, with the winter first, and the summer second.

1992 was the last year to have both winter (Albertville) and summer (Barcelona) Olympic games in the same year.

Then, two years later, in 1994, the Winter Olympics were held again, in Lillehammer, Norway. This was a decision made by the International Olympic Committee in 1986. As one who’s always watched the Olympics, I thought it was a good idea, even if it felt weird to have the winter games again so soon that first time.

Now, of course, it just feels normal, and I would imagine that from an organizational standpoint it was a good decision. This way, you’re not taxing the officials to be super busy in one year only out of four.

David and I tend to watch more of the winter games than we do of the summer ones. Looking at our lives, that doesn’t make any sense, really. I did skate as a kid, but living out in a rural area, with only two friends close by, there was never any opportunity to go sledding or tobogganing—and no hills whatsoever close by that were available for that purpose.

And really, while I loved skating and would skate on the frozen pond-slash-marshy area that was across the road from our house back in the day, I wasn’t ever the athletic type. Activity was never really encouraged when I was a kid, and, not living in a town, there weren’t any organized local sports in my area. Or at least, there were never any that I knew of.

For David’s part, he never had any interest in hockey. He did live in a town, but he told me years ago that his father didn’t want him to participate in little league baseball or any other organized sport, because it would interfere with his golf trips with his buds and his week every summer at a cottage.

My mother did arrange for me to have dance classes and to be a majorette when I was about twelve, but I didn’t excel at either of those activities. I did twirl my baton in a few parades, but after a couple of years, we agreed—my mother and I—that I had gleaned all I could from that particular experience.

Despite our lack of athleticism, David and I both do love to watch the winter games! Monday night we watched some women’s freestyle skiing, I think its subtitle was “big air”? We also watched the mixed team ski jumping. We are looking forward to catching some curling in the coming week. Not the mixed teams, but the regular men’s and then women’s team event. There are the round robin portion that will lead into the semi-finals. And then of course, the bronze medal game, followed by the gold medal game.  

The first year that curling was reinstated as a medal sport at the Olympics (1998) was the first time we’d ever watched the sport, and we were both into it.

We also have watched a lot of figure skating in the past. We liked the pairs and the ice dancing, especially. We were yacking back and forth as we watched that freestyle event, and we both agree that these athletes make their sports look so easy. And we marveled as those women in the freestyle event went down the huge drop, some backwards, and then leapt and spun in the air, then landed and again, some backwards. We thought it wasn’t just toned muscles one would need to compete in that event, but nerves of steel.

I confessed, and David agreed, we would both be shaking on our skis and feeling ill just standing at the top of that hill, envisioning hurling ourselves down.

I suppose that one could class our viewing of the winter games as a kind of passive patriotism. We always cheer team Canada on, of course. But we also cheer on all the young women and men who have worked hard, and who strive to be stronger, higher, faster, to be the best that they can be.

The Olympics have served as a vehicle for worldwide friendships. They also provide us with the chance, for a brief time, for us to come together as people, our focus on something not egocentric, something that, at its heart and soul, is not connected to politics.

It’s a time to celebrate those who’ve had a dream, who’ve set goals, and who’ve dedicated themselves to a course of action. It’s a time to cheer on those who leave it all out there and lay it all down in the trying. Winning is of course the north star, but it isn’t the only benefit to be had from the process. Yes, the glory of the gold belongs to the winners, and I’m certain serves to motivate them.

But I also believe that those who have given their all but, in the end, fall short can still stand tall, and for one very important reason.

The odds were against them, and there were no guarantees, and it did indeed take long, tough hours over years where much would be sacrificed again, and again, and again just to reach the point where they earned the privilege to compete at the Olympics. Yet, despite all of that, they stepped up and gave it their best, anyway.

Or, to paraphrase the immortal words of Theodore Roosevelt, at least they failed by daring greatly, thus distinguishing themselves from those who never find the gumption to even try.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 February 2, 2022

For the next two days we’re supposed to get more snow—anywhere from 8 to 10 inches more, in fact. A significant winter storm, the forecast said. Most of what we’ve already received is still on the ground, though a tiny bit has melted from the few times the sun shone down. Before I went to bed last night the temperature outside had begun to rise. It was 40 at eleven last night. According to the weather network, when the storm began it would be with rain. I’ve seen this movie before. The rain looks like a friend as it melts some of the old snow, then the temperature drops, the rain on the snow freezes, and then is covered with a ton of new snow. I’ve seen that movie, and I hate that movie.

But last night as I took in this information, my most pressing concern as I thought about this scenario playing out once more was this: how on earth is the groundhog supposed to emerge from his burrow, let alone see his shadow when he, like the rest of us, could be covered in ice and snowed in tomorrow morning?

Well, imagine my surprise (not) when I awoke this morning to….nothing. No ice. No new snow. I shook my head and checked the weather network dot com again, and of course, the hourly forecast show this latest rendition of snowmageddon beginning at ten a.m. today.

We’ll see if they have it right this time.

Meanwhile, today is February second, Groundhog Day. We here in the Ashbury household have always celebrated the day. You may recall that my husband David, before he retired, worked at an open pit mine. A quarry, which was an outdoor job all year round.

The great hope of Groundhog Day was always the possibility of an early spring. He loved that job but outside in the winter could be brutal. By the first of February, his craving for spring was a real thing.

In the United States, the most famous groundhog is Punxsutawney Phil. But there’s also Staten Island Chuck, and Milltown Mel (New Jersey), Buckeye Chuck, in Ohio, Woodstock Willie in Illinois, Potomac Phil, in Washington, D.C., Birmingham Bill in Alabama, and Sir Walter Wally in Raleigh, North Carolina.

We have a couple of groundhogs in Eastern Canada, too—Shubenacadie Sam in Nova Scotia, and of course, Wiarton Willie, here in Ontario.

Despite the fact that I have touched on the subject of Groundhog Day in more than one of these essays, I always have to look up to see how this prognosticating thing goes. So here it is, straight from the authentic academic accreditations of Wikipedia: If a groundhog emerging from its burrow in this day sees its shadow due to clear weather, it will retreat to its den and winter will go on for six more weeks; if it does not see its shadow because of cloudiness, spring will arrive early.

Or as I explained it to my kids, either way, it’s six weeks more weeks, because Groundhogs cannot really predict the arrival of spring.

Our oldest never truly cared one way or another, until he left school to work with his father at the quarry. Now, all these years later, he’s still in the same industry, a manager, and usually gets a few weeks off in the winter. When the forecast from Wiarton Willy wasn’t a good one, he would joke aloud, wondering if anyone would get angry enough to go groundhog hunting.

I had to tell him of that old saying: don’t shoot the messenger.

Now, in the interests of clarity, and brevity, I will reveal two American and two Canadian results of this year’s rodent climate prognosticators: Both Punxsutawney Phil and Shubenacadie Sam declare six more weeks of winter. Staten Island Chuck and Wiarton Willie have proclaimed an early spring.

And I think, as I usually do, that we’ll get spring-like weather beginning on April 1, 2022—following the six months of winter that by then will have played out from October to March, inclusive.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury