January 26, 2022
To quote a well-know cartoon
character from my long-ago Saturday morning TV watching days, shiver me
timbers!
Yes, it’s true, I have lived
within about forty miles of this house I now call home for all of my
life. And yes, I do know that winter is one of the four seasons that we get here,
every single year. I even acknowledge that it is the one season that appears to
have the most days in it despite what the calendar may indicate about season parity.
As you know, the calendar says winter begins December 21 and ends March 21. I
say it’s October to March, inclusive. That’s how it’s been in my mind since
reaching adulthood, and I accept that as being a reasonable analysis.
But holy moly, Batman! I have
to tell you that these “sub-zero days” as we’ve always called them never get
any easier to handle (and yes that is about minus 10 Fahrenheit which was the
measuring system that was in place when my brain’s synapses finished forming).
Two days this past week it
took our relatively new furnace several hours to heat the house sufficiently
for the thermostat in the living room to read 72 degrees. I awoke and then got
out of bed at nine a.m. one day and saw that the temperature was 67 degrees. The
furnace begins to work toward 72 (from an overnight setting of 65) at about
6:30 am. Now, one is not going to freeze to death in a room that is 67 degrees,
Fahrenheit no matter what our inner whining imp wants to claim. By just after
noon hour that day, the room was finally at 72. But it wasn’t a “warm” 72. It
was, my inner whining imp insisted, a “chilly” 72.
The next day was a repeat
performance, except the house was at 72 by ten-thirty. Our poor old house is
missing some insulation in some outside walls and needs new weatherstripping for
the back door. Now, as we’ve been renovating, we’ve done what we can about
that. Also, the plans are in place to, at some point this year, finish insulating,
and sheeting, our upstairs. That alone will make a heck of a difference in the
building’s ability to retain heat.
In the meantime, however, we
have an electric heater in my office, and plenty of blankets and heating pads,
otherwise. I have sweaters, and fuzzy socks, and I still have several pairs of “leg
warmers”. We even have an electric blanket which is big enough to share, which we
haven’t yet resorted to but will, if needs be. We’ll survive just fine. I don’t
deal well with being cold, so you can be sure I’ll do whatever is necessary to
ensure I’m not cold for any longer than necessary.
However, as much as I truly do
not like winter, it is a very good time of year for making comfort food—meatloaf,
pot roast, and of course, home made soups, which are staples here these days.
It’s good to warm up on the inside as well as on the outside. On Sunday, I created
a nice cream of mushroom soup, and that made everyone very toasty and content on
the inside.
The numbers of current Covid
infections have been coming down slowly in our area, but they are still higher
than they were for all of the pandemic prior to December 28, 2021, when this
latest surge exploded. They’re still in triple digits and that is just way too
high for our not very populated area.
Ontario ended in-restaurant
dining a few weeks ago, and I could only shake my head that at that time all other
indoor gatherings, meaning private
gatherings, were limited to five people. The reason for my reaction? Well, do
you recall that a year ago I mentioned to you that we were going to have a
small, very small gathering on the day after Christmas? And then, that was
squashed when December 26, 2020 became the day that a long lockdown began here
in Ontario. Well, this year, again due to the girls’ work schedules, family Christmas
of 2021 was to be celebrated at Sonja’s on January 18th – which ended
up being just into the time during which these latest, new restrictions came
into force.
What can you do? Really, just go with the flow. There won’t be
a large crowd that will gather for this, only 7 adults and 1 toddler. All but
the baby have been double vaccinated, and 2 are awaiting reaching the six month
mark in order to get their boosters. We don’t yet have a revised date for our
small celebration, but it’s looking—at this point—like it’ll be sometime in
February.
I should note here that the
latest we’ve held our “family Christmas” was in April, and that was a few years
before anyone had ever heard of Covid-19.
We’re expecting another few
inches of snow on the ground before the week’s end. I’m just hoping that it doesn’t
all come at once. The last snowfall delayed the pickup of our garbage, to the
point that I was asked on Friday by my fellow residents to call the county
office about it. I was polite, of course, and I can report that the next day, the
problem was resolved satisfactorily.
Lately I’ve been musing that
time doesn’t seem to work the same as it used to, and I think that’s because
some of the solid, heretofore non-changing elements in all our lives have
indeed changed. A friend recently said to me that she’d read an article that claimed
we were all suffering, due to the pandemic and to one degree or another, from
PTSD—Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I think she’s absolutely right.
It may get worse before it gets
better, but one thing is certain: we are all absolutely in this thing, together.
Let’s take some comfort in that.
Love,
Morgan
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury
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