November 2, 2022
The good news is that
according to the Ashbury Household Standard Measure, the winter of 22 – 23 already
has one month in the bag! We in this family hold as truth that winter in our part
of Canada is from October to March, inclusive. The bad news is that it is
November, and so far, while the temperature outside is slightly above normal for
this time of year, it’s most definitely dampish out there—or has been until
this morning.
Today is supposed to be mainly
sunny the rest of the day. We’re at that point in the year when my gaze does
tend to scan down on the weather network’s site to that all-important
statistic: expected hours of sunlight. Yesterday I looked up the forecast for
Wednesday, and saw it boasted we’ll have 8 hours today. But of course, just
because it’s in the forecast does not mean it will come to fruition.
Monday was rainy off and on
and Tuesday began with a bit of rain and completely overcast skies. No wonder
the critters look around and begin to frantically prepare to hibernate at this
time of year.
Stepping inside from outside,
I can proudly report that our own “nut gathering” is complete, at least to the
extent that we have room to store things. Our gardens have been emptied of
vegetation, the first round of leaf blowing and bagging has been done, and yesterday
saw another trip made to the town’s landfill site to offload a carload of junk.
It is our goal to reduce the amount of stuff we have here. The top goal is to
complete the renovations upstairs, to make the house more fuel efficient going
forward. But there is just too much stuff stored up there to work—at least for
the time being. It won’t likely take too long to fix that little thing.
But of all the accomplishments
that have been achieved over the last month as we were in full winter-prep mode,
the one that stands out is this: finally, after a period of about eighteen months,
I once more have my clock up on the wall here in my office.
I suppose the fact that this
clock is on the same wall as the front door—the east facing outer wall—is at
the root of the challenge we’ve had, keeping that clock in place. My husband
hung this clock the day I bought it, oh probably more than five years ago now,
and yes, it’s kind of a fussy design, with a couple of spiral-like extensions that
are supposed to look like vines, complete with leaves, positioned at 10 and 5.
It’s a burnished metal in colour, the clock face is beige with tan leaves that
you have to look closely at to see that they are indeed leaves. When I went
clock shopping this was the one that I liked, so I bought it at our local
Walmart, and yes, it was very affordable (but not quite cheap). And a necessary
purchase as the previous small clock I had in that same position had stopped
working.
The first time my husband hung
the clock up it stayed up there for a few months before someone slammed the
front door really hard—and the clock came down!
Of course, this is a very
packed office and when that clock fell it went straight down to the floor, behind
an almost five-foot high bookshelf. The only way to retrieve that clock was to
go down onto the floor, on hands and knees, under my desk and reach behind that
bookcase that is exactly to the right….
That first time it took only a
couple of weeks for David to accomplish the task of retrieving and rehanging
that clock.
The last time that
clock fell because, again, someone slammed the front door, was roughly eighteen
months ago. Note I emphasized “last time” because I think the total number of
times its happened is 6 or 7). And in the interim, after that last time, both husband
and daughter would come into my office, at least several times a week, and while
in here with me for whatever reason would glance up to where the clock should
have been… to check the time.
My standard line when that
happened was: “The clock is not up there. It fell, if you will recall, and it can’t
raise itself.” It got to the point that I would watch for that quick glance up,
hoping beyond hope that at some point one of them would do what I absolutely could
not do, physically. I hoped that one of them would retrieve that poor clock
from its obscurity behind the bookshelf.
Now, David made a good first
step back in May and finally went under my desk and did that very thing.
I dusted it off and saw that it was still working, and then he set it on one of
the bookshelves in an adjacent unit. He laid it flat, because that was the only
way that clock was going to be able to be on the shelf. This meant, of course,
you couldn’t read the time, but it was there. Ready for when he planned to come
back a little bit later to hang it.
Finally, after more than one request
on my part and several promises on his, David managed the feat last week. This
time, he assured me, that clock was not going to come down, no how, no way. I’m
hoping that since he used a drill and really seemed to be focused on the task
at hand, his declaration proves true.
And while I could resist the
pun, I am not going to, so brace yourselves and get ready to groan.
Only time will tell how long that
clock stays up on the wall, going forward.
Love,
Morgan
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