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Moving Quickly

Moving Quickly

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The story today is the cold.

Record-shattering. Bone-chilling. Cold I must soon confront.

Which raises some questions: Why do I have no corduroy pants that fit? What can I wear that is warm enough for this craziness? And most importantly, when will it ever be spring?

Until there are answers to these questions there is only one course of action — plunging in. No, I won’t be skating anytime soon. But I will be walking, running, moving quickly. That’s my way to get through the winter — and the cold.

Fox Prints

Fox Prints

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Our first real snow of the season — white, fluffy, measurable — and my first real glimpse of it out the front window. As I open the blinds a fox darts across the driveway from the right. He was spry, lean, red, dashing. He was moving from one stand of trees to another, to the woods behind the house across the street.

Maybe I startled him, or maybe not. Maybe he always moves that quickly, bushy tail flying. A wild thing for sure. But a wild thing with proprioception, aware in his animal way of how easily he was spotted.

I wish I could have caught him on camera. His redness so much redder against the sparkly whiteness of the snow. But my camera was many steps away.

Instead, I made do with the prints he left behind.

Laughing in the Face of Winter

Laughing in the Face of Winter

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The best story I have about the weekend’s bitter cold weather happened as I was walking into the grocery store Sunday morning. I had dropped by after church to pick up bagels but was sorry I did. The parking lot was a sheet of ice, and the snow melt being tossed onto it by a earnest employee was being blown right back into the guy’s face.

Snow and ice bring out the little old lady in me. Instead of darting from one errand to another, which is my wont, I do a mincing two-step. My theory is simple: I would like to keep darting from one errand to another. I would like to avoid breaking my leg or wrist.

I was aware there were people behind me but I didn’t recognize them until I was walking in the door. It was the older woman and her son (son-in-law?) who had sat in the pew in front of me at church.

The woman seemed a bit remote during the service, but when a frigid gust struck her, she shouted “whoa” and then exploded with the most authentic, daring laugh. The temperature was in the single digits and she wore no hat or gloves; the 30-mile-per-hour wind was picking up the edges of her brown cape and tossing them around. But she treated the dangerous cold as a petty nuisance, a slightly unruly child. She laughed in the face of winter. She’s my new role model.

Remembering Snowmaggedon

Remembering Snowmaggedon

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Five years ago today the first flakes flew in a storm called Snowmaggedon, which dumped close to three feet of snow here before it was done.  It was, next to a couple of rough Chicago winters, the most snow I had ever seen. It closed schools and offices and slowed life to a pioneer pace. It spurned removal; some neighborhoods weren’t plowed for a week.

Though grocery shelves were empty and some folks were climbing the walls by the time it was over, it was for me — and for many — the pause button I’d been waiting for.

There were long lazy hours for reading and writing, for making soup and baking rolls. Time for walking down the middle of a busy road because it was impassable for cars.  Time to start this blog.

It was, in short, the world upside down and white. Will it happen again? Not this year, from the looks of it. But the groundhog predicts six more weeks of winter. We can always hope.

What’s On Our Minds

What’s On Our Minds

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On the radio. On the television. On weather websites.

 At home and at the office, too.

It’s what we talk about, think about, speculate about.

Maybe it will happen. Maybe it won’t.

I’m leaning toward the latter these days.

Step Lively

Step Lively

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When bitter winds howl in from the west, when temperatures dip into the teens, when the sidewalk harbors little patches of black ice and there’s a quarter-mile of pavement between me and the next warm building, this is what I do. Step lively.

It’s what some Metro conductors suggest. “Step lively,” they say. “Doors closing.”

It’s what race-walkers do, with a bounce in their gait and a swivel of their hips.

Step lively, with its whiff of the nautical, its sprightliness and energy and pep.

Step lively. It’s more hop than saunter, more snap than sizzle. It’s quaint and practical and fun.

Step lively. It’s a good way to get through winter.

Time for Sun

Time for Sun

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What a difference the sun makes. It’s cold, slightly above freezing, a steady breeze blowing off the lake. But the day is friendly, not the alien weather of yesterday, which was inhospitable to humans.

I say this from experience, after first rambling along the shore and then trudging up to the ridge, where the combination of exertion and distance from the lake made the temperature almost bearable.

Today there are sounds of life, some hammering next door, an occasional car engine. It’s time for me to go outside — if for no other reason than to know how good it feels to come back in! 

Rain Power

Rain Power

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I don’t love the rain but I do appreciate its force and manner, the way it reminds us of elemental things, of topography, for instance.

My neighborhood is laced with the tributaries of Little Difficult Run, and when showers are heavy these timid trickles become raging torrents. I’ve seen bridges lifted off their moorings and deposited downstream. I’ve seen small lakes form as creeks flood their banks and become rivers. I’ve seen trees topple, their roots torn from rain-loosened soil.

Today’s deluge is not enough for that. But it’s enough to make me remember.

(Before the storm.)

Late Summer

Late Summer

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Here we are in the dog days of … September?  I’ve always counted early September weather as the most reliably pleasant of the year (blue skies, low humidity, plenty of sunshine).

This year quite the opposite. It will be 94 today. The air conditioning, mostly off all summer, finally has a chance to flex its muscles. We had September weather in July; now we’re having July weather in September.

I’m glad for this sticky heat that makes me long for fall. Late summer in more ways than one.

Where the Rain Begins

Where the Rain Begins

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Last evening, after a long day at the office, I was sitting in the car waiting to turn left from the park and ride lot when I saw the rain begin. It was less than 50 away from me. I could see it sheeting the cars paused on the other side of the light but it hadn’t yet reached me.

At first it was like that infinite pause between when you cut your finger and you start to feel the pain from the cut — there’s often a lag there. On the other hand, there was a fellow-feeling with those cars drenched before mine, a sympathetic pain, almost flinching from rain that was not yet there.

Then I watched the rain advance across the pavement, fat drop by fat drop until finally it was pounding, pouring, a deluge.

I drove the two miles home with the wipers on full blast, and then, by the time I pulled in the driveway, it had almost stopped again.

I love the mercurial weather of summer, its flightiness, its lack of steady intentions.

And last night I loved watching the rain begin.