01.14.18

“I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, “Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.”
― Lewis Carroll

I’ve been watching this tree from my bathtub since Christmas.  Each snow storm has coated it with snow, bending it down, and at one point, it was completely buried in white.  The melting rains have revealed it once again, and I thought it might have broken its back.  I keep calling it “my tree” and on frozen fog, weary and gray days, I think I look just like it, all huddled down and spent.  I trudged through the snow this afternoon, just to check on it, and I’m fairly confident it will stand upright again.  The ‘darling is sleeping, till the summer comes again.’

We’ve made it to January’s midpoint already.   Sinclair Lewis wrote, “Winter is not a season it’s an occupation”.   Joy and I chatted on the phone today and she remarked at how “inhospitable” Winter makes life.  But, we’re all making it through.  She said crowds of kids were sledding next door at Pioneer Park, and she had posted photos on Facebook of the stunning ice sculpture which Duncan and Anna had made in their front yard.  While we talked, Duncan was putting a cookie sheet filled with water into the freezer, to create a TV, which would be put into the living room they had created on the front lawn– a sofa, an easy chair, and a battery-operated candle inside the side table’s lamp of ice.

We’re leaving in the morning for two days at Chico Hot Springs to join the Miller family.  There is nothing quite like sitting in the hot pool in mid-winter, beer in hand, snowflakes falling, having good conversations with old friends.  We’re all making it through.