“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.”
We are stuck in winter. The warmth of last week is a memory, a wish, a want. This morning is in the low 30’s. I may have to wear socks. It is serious when I break out the socks.
Yesterday was a day of rest. I stayed home in my cozies with an afghan around my shoulders. I zoomed my uke lesson. I napped twice. I coughed a bit. It seems this plague hasn’t quite disappeared.
When I was in Ghana, reading was my greatest pleasure. I read everything I could get my hands on. I got Reader’s Digest in the mail, a few months late and several together, but it didn’t matter. I read the magazine cover to cover. It was sent free for two years, a gift from Reader’s Digest to Peace Corps volunteers. It was an amazing gift, a most valuable gift.
The house I mostly grew up in was small. It had three bedrooms sandwiched around a tiny hall. The living room was the biggest room. The kitchen was narrow. The appliances were small. Even now I can close my eyes and see that kitchen. I can see my mother at the sink doing dishes. I can hear my father complaining about dirty glasses on the counter, his bugaboo. We were supposed to wash out the glass and leave it in the sink. Sometimes we did.
I have a winter jacket. I never wear it. I have scarves and mittens and earmuffs. I don’t wear them either. I usually wear a hoodie or a fleece if it is really cold. Mostly I just go from the house to the car to the store then back again so I don’t need to layer. I do have boots, but I don’t know where I’ve put them.
A little bit ago, no dogs were on the couch with me. That is unusual. I figured they were still out so I went to check. That was when I heard it, the stampede, two big dogs coming down the stairs. It was thunder. It was a herd of mustangs. It was Henry and Nala. They had been upstairs sleeping on my bed. Now they are in their usual nap positions. Henry is at the end of the couch. Nala is beside me under a blanket. Such easy lives they lead.
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keepthecoffeecoming.blog 
January 18, 2024 at 2:39 pm
Hi Kat,
Here, today winter took a break. Yesterday the temperature climbed above 33° for the first time this week, and we turned off all the slowly running faucets. My spouse can’t sleep well with the sound of running water in the next room. It’s better than having frozen and then burst pipes. Today’s high will be a tropical 58°. However, tomorrow and Saturday the lows will be in the 20s, so we will run the water again. Valentine’s Day 2021 we had four or five days with low temperatures down to -7° F. We also had rolling blackouts. We averaged two hours a day without electricity. Unfortunately, there is still a possibility of rolling blackouts. Our worthless Republican legislators and governor refused to go after the energy folks who during that arctic outbreak caused billions of dollars in insurance claims for water damage from burst pipes, and they cost a couple of hundred people’s their lives.
My son, who moved to Chicago last year, spent his first cold snap up there with sub zero temperatures. He did buy gloves and a hat, but doesn’t want to buy a coat because he said it’s too hot inside stores when wearing a coat. He just does layers. Whatever melts his butter, you don’t get sick from being cold. 🙂
I’m also amazed that the houses where we grew up were tiny and we didn’t care. Do you remember single door refrigerators, with the small internal freezer compartment? I remember my mother having to defrost the refrigerator and freezer monthly. Back then frost free was just being introduced in new refrigerators. Or, how did we live without central air and heat? We just suffered.:-(
January 19, 2024 at 1:57 am
Hi Bob,
I know where your winter went. It came here. 29 was the high for today, a bit warmer than it has been. We will have freezing weather for the next few days, but by next week we should be back to 40. We are lucky not to have snow or ice, but the forecast is for both tomorrow. I have no plans until Sunday so I’ll hunker down.
I don’t need to leave the faucet running. My pipes have never frozen. My cellar is above ground and it has vents so there is some warmth. One of the other things you can do to safeguard your pipes is leave the doors open on the cupboard under the sink. That will keep them warm.
Rolling blackouts in this cold are horrendous. It never takes long for the house to feel cold. I remember being without electricity for so long during one storm that my house got down to 37.
I am sort of the same as your son. I am never outside so long so I don’t wear my jacket. I wear a flannel shirt and a heavy sweater. That combo seems to work well to keep me warm.
My fridge was exactly as you described with the small freezer on the top. I remember how heavy with ice it would get. My father attacked it as if it were the enemy. He put a bowl with hot water in it to loosen the ice then he’d chip away at it with a knife. It was quite the chore.
We always had heat. We had hot water heat with radiators I loved the sounds the water made coursing through the pipes to the radiator. I never minded the heat when I was a kid. There was no alternative.
January 19, 2024 at 8:39 am
Oh yes, we keep all the cabinets under the sinks open. Here we can’t have basements. So the pipes run through the slab and then up through the walls. We can’t have basements because of the clay soil. When it gets wet it expands and contracts when dry. This would crack the basement walls. Foundation repair is a big business in Texas.
January 19, 2024 at 11:36 pm
I have a full cellar with four regular size windows. It is a bit colder than the rest of the house but plants can live there. In the house I lived in with the family, we had only a dug out cellar, too small for even the washer and dryer.
January 18, 2024 at 3:22 pm
Oops,
We averaged two hours a day with electricity.
January 19, 2024 at 2:01 am
Only two hours of electricity would have me open the faucets for dripping. I’d layer in the house!!