Welcome Sunshine Today!

 We finally had a few hours of sunshine today! It really seemed good, and the temperature was reasonable - in the 20s - but there was a wind that made it seem colder. I didn't get outside until late in the afternoon - after the sun had disappeared. It's been a very busy day for me, which is always a good thing, but today was unusual because I was doing work I should have done on Wednesday and Thursday. Like lots of other people, I was glued to my television for a good portion of both days. I am dismayed over what happened, but not in the least surprised. I have lots of questions in my mind, and no real solutions. I find it interesting that we were so anxious to get 2020 over with, some of us feeling 2021 would be better in many ways - but look at us now. Our government buildings under siege, our population being desecrated by a virus that seems to be mutating like some Hollywood-designed horror creature, people out of work, hungry, angry, depressed and frightened - so what made us think turning over the page of our calendars to a new year would make everything better? We didn't get this way all of a sudden, and the magic wand called 2021 isn't able to fix it all of a sudden, either. It's going to take patience and hard work. And common sense, which has been in short supply on so many levels. 

But I'm an optimist. I still think that conscientious, intelligent, kind-hearted people out number the mean, stupid, narcissistic psychopaths.

So I choose to think of pleasant things. A friend wrote to me a few days ago, and our brief email exchange made me remember the cold winter evenings I enjoyed when I was growing up. I grew up with wood stoves in drafty old houses. Having the front of me hot and my backside freezing or vice versa was ordinary. My parents and I used to sit in front of the kitchen stove on winter nights reading Osa Johnson's book, I Married Adventure, and that is one of my favorite memories. We took turns reading out loud, but always in the kitchen because any other room in the house was too chilly to be comfortable. No heat upstairs at all - we had a trap door covering the stairwell to keep all the heat in the rooms on the ground floor. The trap door worked on a pulley arrangement with a weight that made it easy to push up or lift and eased it back in place gently. Upstairs was frosty cold, but there were flannel sheets, woolen blankets, heavy quilts - and best of all, hot water bottles. Even now I like my bedroom kept cool. The routine was to undress and get into my pajamas in the downstairs bathroom, warm first my front and then my back in front of the wood stove, wrap up in a blanket or bathrobe and make a dash for upstairs (with hot water bottle clutched close). My dad was always up early in the morning to get the fires going full tilt so when I got up, the kitchen was warm and the oatmeal my mother had made the night before would be heating in the double boiler. A little warm maple syrup and fresh milk on my oatmeal and I was good to go. I had oatmeal this morning for breakfast. I still enjoy it, now with maple syrup, milk, raisins and a dash of cinnamon.

It is fun to remember those days, and I know I would complain if I had to live cold like that today. Back then I didn't mind that frost covered my bedroom windows so I couldn't see out, or that the whole house shook when the wind blew - which was mostly all the time up on Cabot Plain. I looked forward to shoveling a path through the big drift that always formed in front of our house. Half way through the winter we sometimes just dug a tunnel through the big drift and that cut down considerably on the shoveling after storms. When I think back on it, I wonder why it didn't seem frightening to have snow sometimes covering the windows for days and blocking the doorways - but it was such an adventure, I never felt the least bit scared. 

I hope we have sunshine tomorrow, though. Spirits rise when the sun shines, and we can all use a lot of that right now. Stay safe, warm and healthy.