You ask why, why the dread...well, when you live in the Northern section of the United States, there are many things to be feared. Last years winter and it repeating itself this year, is something all of us in small business dread...every year. Snowfall after snowfall, always on the weekend too, when people suffering from cabin fever will brave the cold and impossible driving conditions to seek the companionship of another WARM human being, if just to complain about the weather. This year we have the added fuel to the flame with the cost of heating fuel...will we be able to afford it. A friend just had her propane tank filled, $700.00, and I don't know about you, but that would take me all summer to save for that one.
Ice storms that dump rain, quickly frozen, on everything. You can't get to work cause the roads are impassable, hell, you can't even get you car doors open, froze shut, if you can get to your car without crawling to it. Then the branches start falling off the trees from the weight of the ice, knocking down power lines, cable lines and when the computer goes...you know real isolation. Thank the Gods for my art, I always have something to do, albeit candle light.
But there is something...if you think far back to your youth, that makes the harsh reality somewhat sweeter. The days as a child anxious for the first snow, well, for one thing, you knew it would make it so much easier for Santa to get here...but braving the cold to flounce body, full on, into those wonderful peaks that Dad just shoveled into a nice pile out of the drive. Tunnelling into the igloos of winter, to seek that sense of comfort out of the frosted airs, blowing tornadoes of frosted breath at each other, enjoying each warmed puff. It made the frozen fingers and toes, the chapped legs from the boots hitting raw skin, the constant running nose, happily wiped on a sleeve and the slamming of a snowball, dead-center into your little brother's face...ahh, yes winter as a child...
OK, enough of that crap...it is hell on earth, a beautiful hell, but one of fear that we endure each year and this year with the added economic worries of the country...what will it bring to us. Financial devastation, as everyone tightens their belts. Loss of homes to bankruptcy, credit cards maxed to pay for food and heat, construction costs to pay for damages from storms, plowing out driveways from 10 inch dumps, one after the other. You could not get me to move farther North, if you dragged me...as a matter of fact...Florida is looking alot more accessible to me right now and having a Mother living there, sweetens the deal.
But as I write, melancholy, about the coming winters LONG months, you will get some sort of a sense of anxiety in my muse...it is real and it is nearly here. But the joy of walking into the white, with my little furry friend, as the snow on my metal roof slides down at the very moment I shut the door, burying me and the furry companion, you can't help but smile...just one more day in the life...
