“He’s a gentleman: look at his boots.”
Most times I am a quick study and learn easily. Yesterday I overdid and last night I woke up every hour or so in pain, and it’s still here this morning. I guess I keep trying to find the line between okay and ridiculous. Obviously I went over that line yesterday. I do have an addendum about yesterday and locked doors. My plowman was here when I left for an appointment. I told him the de-ice stuff for the steps was inside the house by the door as was his check. He was fine with that and I left. When I got home, I was locked out again. My plowman had noticed my storm door was ajar and he’s a good guy so he closed it. I called my friend Tony and told him he’d need a step ladder. I’m thinking of putting a stepladder permanently against the back porch. In the summer I’ll put plants on it so people will think it a gardening design. How pretty to see the morning glory vines climbing the ladder.
Today is a white day. The sky is white. The trees have a layer of white from the wet snow, and the ground is covered. The sun came out yesterday and melted some of the snow. Last night it froze. Ruts of ice are on the sides of the road and on the pathways. Going out makes for a strange sort of dance of stepping in one place then moving to the side then across and back all with tiny steps which remind me of the Mikado.
I seldom stayed home from school. We, my brother and sisters and I, were all pretty much a healthy bunch. We walked to school on the coldest or the wettest or the snowiest day of the year. It didn’t matter.
This time of year presented to every kid the greatest of all challenges: putting on and taking off boots. Back then they were rubber and they went over our shoes. In the morning, at home, my mother would hold the boots while we pushed and pushed until our shoes were all the way inside then she’d tuck our snow pants into the top of the boot. When we got to school, we’d sit on the floor to pull off our boots. Usually our shoes came with them, but that was just fine. We’d pull out our shoes, put them on and go into the classroom. All of that was the easy part. It was getting dressed to go home which presented the biggest challenge. If the boots were wet, the shoes just wouldn’t go inside all the way, and the bottom part of the boot would flop around. Pushing the shoes in with my hands sometimes worked, sometimes didn’t. Lots of days I’d walk home in my shoes, the boots in my school bag. My mother was never happy when I came home with wet shoes, wet socks and cold feet. Neither was I.
Explore posts in the same categories: Musings Both comments and pings are currently closed.
keepthecoffeecoming.blog 
January 28, 2011 at 12:47 pm
ah…the boots. and the wonderbread wrappers that made them go on and off so much more easily
January 28, 2011 at 10:59 pm
Greg,
What? I never knew about the wonder bread wrappers. No one I knew used them. If only….
January 28, 2011 at 6:25 pm
You just can’t catch a break, can you Kat?
January 28, 2011 at 10:59 pm
Not so far, John.
January 29, 2011 at 12:47 am
Lessons?
http://www.thesurfingsite.com/Surf-Schools-Massachusetts.html
Cheers
January 29, 2011 at 3:05 am
I get entire weeks like that.
You know. When Murphy’s law rules your entire existence and not only does everything go wrong, it finds a way to go wrong many more times than twice.
Not only can you not find the right wood screw you need to finish a project, but you drop the pan with the odd sized screws while looking for one. And you drop it on the garage floor. And the floor is wet with melting slush. And the car’s parked in the garage so sweeping the screws up is almost impossible without moving the car. But you can’t do that, ’cause you’d have to move the car over the spilled screws and take the chance of puncturing a tire. And it’s dark. And you did the very same thing on Monday. And,,,,, it’s only Wednesday.
Yeah, weeks like that.
January 29, 2011 at 4:34 am
I do feel sorry for You even if I smile when reading this 🙂
I don´t know anyone that ever had their shoes in the rubber boots. I have to ask my mother if they ´did like that when they were young. But we had much the same problems getting those rubber boots of too. But it was our socks that always got stuck in the boots.
We took them off when we got inside the class room and placed them by the radiators so they would get dry. If they didn´t we had much the same problems getting them on again when we were going home again 🙂 But I remember our teacher always helped us if they got stuck.
It´s one of those mornings when I just don´t feel warm even if I stand beside the stove. But it´s 33F outside and will stay there for a couple of days.
Have a great day now!
Christer.
January 29, 2011 at 10:01 pm
Minicapt,
One of those places is nowhere near the water.
January 29, 2011 at 10:04 pm
John,
I know exactly what you mean. I figure that once your head connects all the things that could go wrong, they keep going wrong. It’s like living down to expectations.
January 29, 2011 at 10:07 pm
Christer,
I’ll take the pity!
Those were the boots when I was a kid and that was a long time ago.
At school all our outside clothes stayed in the cloakroom. I guess the coats dried, but I don’t remember.
January 29, 2011 at 7:53 am
Hi Kat,
Can you apply a hammer to the offending bit of door in such a manner that it will never offend again? Without, of course, actually breaking anything. The step ladder planter sounds really cool, though.
We had the galoshes with the fold over metal buckles. We rarely buckled them all the way because it just took too long so we clanked a lot. Now I have snow sneakers with fold over Velcro tabs. I don’t always close them up either. Old habits die hard. 🙂
January 29, 2011 at 10:06 pm
Hi Caryn,
I could, but then that door wouldn’t be secure and Gracie jumps against sometimes when she sees another dog invading her neighborhood. I need the door secure against her. I am going to get a different piece than the one I have. I noticed a different one on my back storm door which was just put on a year ago.
I do have boots but they are shoe boots which tie. I never wear them.