I love winter here. It is so very beautiful. And interesting. It doesn’t always snow, but when it does, it leaves a delicate white blanket over everything. It feels fresh. It feels good to bundle up and walk in the snow. Listening to the crunch of my boots as the snow surrenders to my feet.
Winter pleasures are plentiful. Walking on the lake. Throwing the ball for Lila on the lake. Cross-country skiing on the lake. Last year the lake was frozen for six weeks. When the weather warmed up we all missed the ice. It had been a neighborhood playground on weekends. The kids built forts on the islands. Had picnics out there in the middle of the lake. When the sun shines, there is nothing more heartening than feeling the warm radiation in the crisp air.
Yet this year, right now, I am ready to pack it all in and never go outside again! I’ve had enough! It’s cold. It’s dark. It’s unpredictable. We are in the beginnings of a big storm later today, a deluge, a pounding. Maybe 20 – 25 cm of snow. It’s ten degrees below freezing (centigrade) right now. The saying goes: big flakes, little snow; little flakes, big snow. There is a curtain of fine, delicate snow coming down as I write, promising lots of snow with high winds coming to visit later. The weather report says it will snow and then turn to rain tonight and be 10 degrees above freezing tomorrow. Friday night I was invited to dinner and a concert in Halifax. I really did want to go. I got in my car, drove the equivalent of two blocks, turned around and came home. The precipitation was a mixture of snow and rain. It didn’t feel welcoming. Last night there was a party in the neighborhood and I just stayed home.
It’s nice inside now. I think it’s time to either hibernate or migrate! I'm not the only one feeling this way so early in the winter season. A friend just called and said she wants to go south during mid-winter break at NSCAD. Would I join her on a trip to Washington, D.C. (where I grew up; we hardly ever had snow there), go to galleries and museums, see some art. I never thought Washington would be a southern destination but relative to here, it definitely is appealing. But it's more likely I would go to New Jersey to visit Tamar and Ottawa (even colder than here!) to visit Aaron. Who knows. Maybe it will even warm up in January. But at this point we are definitely headed for a white holiday season!
