Silent White

From my bedroom window this morning.

It descends gently at first. A teaser you might call, not threatening at all. But we check the forecasts and know the onslaught is coming soon.

Cancellations pour in, schools, businesses, my helper. No one wants to get caught in the blizzard. Our first winter storm.

Some wag on Facebook said we should close the entire island for the three months of January through March.

My suggestion would be to dig out an underground city. Or at least a smaller version of the hefty one in Toronto. Where there was still a teeming life - noon time bands, many restaurants, retail, medical even a grocery outlet. I could leave my home in the snow in my business suit, no coat or mitts or scarf, warm in my car, and park underground from where I worked. The vast underground life of the city of Toronto. A huge sprawl. Unaffected by weather of any kind. Subway and railway station accessible without going outdoors.

Toronto underground PATH map.

I groceried myself yesterday so I'm prepared. I am also well booked. And kitted with knitting and a queue of streaming at my disposal.

In this new year I am playing my music every day. A mix of songs I would sing in the old folky theatre days, classical. What have you. Today it is Albinoni which lifts the heavy grey sky into summery blue. 

A lovely handmade bag with an inner bag and zippered pockets arrived from Daughter's school friend in Ottawa. I am thrilled beyond measure by her kindness. It will be perfect for my sock projects.

I was intrigued that my phone camera shows the Albinoni album I am playing. A trick I probably couldn't possibly engineer myself. I love accidental discoveries. I feel digitally thrilled as a brother gave me this incredible Bluetooth speaker that enhances the sound on my phone to concert levels.

Hunkering.

Our winter begins sometime in February always. Now it has snowed here. Savagely. But I am taken care of. Odd that. I only worry about reality. I don't worry about possibilities or what ifs. Tons of snow: I worry. I look out at it and worry who is going to take care of the massive might of it, carelessly drifted into high unclimbable barriers, rendering egress impossible for car or human.

Pat comes along with his plough once the last flake has floated to earth. How he knows this, I'm not sure. I call it magic. He did this at 9 or so last night.

And Leo comes along with a bright red shovel at 10 this morning and frees up the garage that has a two foot high snow drift in front of it and corrects my dismal attempts to smooth a path from my backdoor in order to let the dog out.

See what I mean?

And now it's pelting down this kind of fog-rain-snow mix, bitter tiny flakes of icy fog coming down in a thick curtain. But I'll be taken care of. This I believe.

I do a little shoveling for the dog but having seen a 33 year old man drop dead in front of me one time as he shovelled I have tremendous respect for the effects of this strenuous activity on the heart. Especially at my age.

So today? I bake bread, I simmer a stew in the ancient old crockpot, I re-edit another 100 pages of a book that someone is interested in, I look at the really rather lovely afghan I am working on (pictures to follow in a week or so) and ponder the wise words of a friend on the phone yesterday:

"Why do we wait for bad weather to give ourselves the permission to do exactly what we want to do and have the kind of day we truly want?"

So yes, I am disciplined but in a good hunkery way. The house is full of the smell of freshly baked bread mingled with the aroma of the stew, in between I'm reading a most fabulous book - more on that later too - and my knitting beckons for later on.

Hunkering is excellent. It doesn't need bad weather.

At all.

Hunkering

Can you believe the way the snow crept up my window? Photo taken this a.m.

The thing about storms and hunkering is that regular hours can be thrown for a loop. I couldn't sleep last night, the howling of the wind and those odd creaky things in an old house that come blaringly to life in a storm has thrown my night into day, day into night.

The 3.00 a.m. horror show also appeared - you know how that goes, don't you? Every thought you've had since you were two comes to life. First day of school is there, then a brand new film for me: beloved grandfather dying, mama weeping for what seemed like months afterwards. And no, you can't go to the funeral, we want you to remember him the way he was which always led me to the belief it was a huge big scam and Granddad had run off somewhere never to be seen again. So that film played for a couple of hours inevitably leading to the deaths of other beloveds and maybe it was my turn tonight, and the what about the dog? thought, this time left with my corpse? Would she howl? Eat me? Great, enough of that now.

I could go on and on about the stark raving horrors of the three ayems. I wrote a poem about it one time. And I salute the almighty power of the search engine for locating it:

In the three ayem darkness
To a mind run amok.
In the afternoon rainstorm
To depression unstuck.

In the loan of a shoulder,
To the lean of a hold,
In the ear of attention
To the warmth from the cold.

In the years gone behind us,
To the old you and me,
In the comfort we offer
To the days yet to be.

Written in 2002. I was young then. Well, old then. Well, much older now. In that way of passing sixty at high speed.

It is still windy out and drizzling. Cabin fever hasn't set in yet. I truly love being isolated in times such as these.

It sets the mind to dreaming without interruption.