The snow showers will start tonight but will turn to rain here on the cape. The rain will continue into tomorrow, a warm tomorrow in the 40’s. Over an inch of rain is predicted. 

The birds were many at the feeders this morning. The two goldfinches from yesterday brought a friend. Mr. Cardinal joined his wife. A robin dropped by, the first time here. The stalwarts, the usual birds, were in and out, chickadees, nuthatches and titmice. I noticed a couple of the feeders need to be filled. I put that on the to do list.

When I was young, I saw the magic. I saw the field below my house bright with blinking fireflies. I’d check out the man in the moon. I swear he had two expressions. He was either smiling or open mouthed as if surprised. I saw the shapes of the snowflakes and sometimes stood outside to catch them on my tongue. My face would get a layer of snow. I always wondered how there could be so many flakes all different in shape. Jumping over the double O railroad ties saved my mother from a broken back. I wasn’t really sure about that one, but I didn’t want to tempt fate so I jumped. My mother never did get a broken back. Coincidence? I didn’t think so. On one trip to Boston, my father bought peanuts for us to give to the squirrels. Back then they hadn’t yet become the spawns of Satan. I remember being surrounded by  squirrels who knew I had peanuts, a bit of squirrel telepathy. They’d stand on their back feet to get closer to me. They took the peanuts right out of my hand. How could that be? 

 When I got older, I was so busy I didn’t take the time to see the magic, even forgot about it though it still surrounded me. I remember it all came back one night when I sat on my new deck. My backyard had fireflies. I saw the blinking. I saw the magic. 

The magic is all around me again. When it snows, I turn on the back light so I can watch the flakes fall. I am still amazed. The fireflies come back every summer. I sit on the deck and follow them with my eyes. I love light rides at Christmas. I ooh and ahh. I think the man in the moon is mostly smiling. He knows I found the magic again.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

While my coffee was brewing, I watched out the kitchen window at the birds and the feeders. I was thrilled to see two goldfinches dining at the thistle feeder. I had just filled it the other day. Today I’ll fill the sunflower seed feeders. 

When I was a kid, Valentine’s Day was exciting. Before the big day, we’d shop at Woolworth’s for my valentines. They had a picture on the front and a corny saying. I remember one with a camel which said, “I can go without water but not without you.” The backs were blank and that’s where I wrote my name. Kathleen is a long name which didn’t fit the back so my name was slanted or the last few letters of my name didn’t fit. I always added the R for Ryan as there were a few Kathleens in my class. I remember taking my time to write in my best handwriting. 

I remember art class a week or so before Valentine’s Day. We decorated shoe boxes and they became Valentine boxes. A slit at the top was where the valentines went into the box. 

We had a party at school on the big day but not until after lunch. I remember walking to school carrying my precious box and the cookies or cupcakes my mother had made for the party. The boxes were stashed under our desks. The morning was endless. We had our regular subjects, but we were more fixated on the boxes under our desks.

After lunch the festivities began. The nun’s desk held all of the goodies. The Valentine’s boxes were on our desks. We went row by row to pass out our valentines. I remember just hoping no one would pass me by. We all to wait until every row had given out their valentines. After that, we’d get our goodies, sit at our desks and open the  valentines. We’d show each other the special ones and the ones from the boys. 

The party lasted until the end of the day. We’d clean up the classroom just before the final bell. I put my valentines in my box, in my treasure chest. I’d carry the box home with solemnity befitting the treasures inside. I’d get home and show my mother all my valentines. I kept them safe in that box for the longest time. 

The rain makes the day gloomy. Right now it is 41° and foggy. The birds are back. They were missing for a while. This morning I saw several chickadees and Mrs. Cardinal. Yesterday I filled one of the feeders with a different seed. It is supposedly anti-spawn. I put the seed in the feeder the spawns usually sit on to dine, the one the chickadees favor. I’m thinking the seed might have some hot pepper which deters the spawns. 

Chickens are dirty. They are also creatures of habit. That comes into this story later. In Ghana, I had chickens. The first sitting hen was a gift. She was a horrible mother and lost her chicks, a few at a time, probably to snakes. We ate her. My next hen was a good mother. All her chicks lived and spent the nights roosting in my backyard. Other volunteers often visit. If they stayed overnight, the custom was they either brought food or gave a little money. One of the volunteers I trained with came to visit. I was cordial though I wasn’t fond of the guy. I don’t think any of us were. He was haughty and annoying. He went to John’s Hopkins and told us that all the time. We weren’t impressed. It was the harmattan when he came. I was sleeping outside on my mattress. I put another one outside for him and carefully placed it in the yard. Early the next morning I heard him scream. I wasn’t surprised. I had placed his mattress where the chickens always walk to go out the gate. The chickens jumped on him. He was directly in their path. I pretended to be surprised. 

Sometimes I have a flash, a picture, from my memory drawers. When I visit where I grew up, I take a nostalgia ride passing the places from my childhood. I always go by the duplex where we lived for so long. I can see my father raking the front yard and my mother hanging up laundry. The small hill where, to my father’s consternation, I’d ride down on my bike is there. All it is missing are tire tread marks. I go by houses where my friends used to live. I remember their names and can see their faces. Some even still live in town. 

I am sometimes surprised by the memories I have of when I was young. They aren’t of life changing events. They are small memories, ones I didn’t realize I was making, but I am always glad for them. They give me joy.

Here I am thinking the air feels warm, but it is only 33°. It is cloudy. The day looks gloomy, uninviting. I have uke practice tonight. We are playing love songs of the 60’s, songs from my heyday.

It is a typical morning. The dogs have been out twice. Nala comes in on her own while Henry whines at the dog door for me to let him inside. They’ve had their morning treats, Buddy biscuits. Both of them are now sleeping on the couch. It’s nap time.

My Christmas tree had been standing in my living room since Christmas. It was covered with the tree bag meant to capture the needles. I didn’t move the tree outside earlier as it was too tall and too heavy. Yesterday I decided to tackle the task. It was awful. I managed to get the tree near the door then I went outside hoping to pull it through the threshold. It got stuck. Nothing moved. I grabbed branches and pulled. All the needles fell. I cut my hand somehow. I changed my strategy and pulled the side branches out one at a time. It worked. The tree is on the front lawn still in the white bag. I couldn’t remove the bottom of the tree stand so I’ll have to try again today. I hope no one looks too closely at that tree bag. I can see the blood from my cut all over it. Maybe I should bury it in the backyard. 

When I was a kid, a penny was valuable. I could buy penny candy. Sometimes I could get two pieces of candy for a penny. That was a good day. Now, the penny will join analog time, cursive, dial phones, typewriters, yellow pages, maps and so much much more. 

I thought about all the sayings and idioms about pennies. Those too will be gone, thrown on the trash pile of archaic language. I’m thinking a penny for my thoughts is probably now worth a dollar and even more, but it just doesn’t sound right. How about the bad penny who always shows up? That phrase is centuries old. A penny saved is a penny earned. Some things used to cost a pretty penny. How can you change penny dreadful? Nothing else fits. How about penny pinching? The worse is no more pennies from heaven. We are now or will soon be bereft of divine intervention.

’The morning is cloudy and cold, 33°. My car was covered in frost when I went to get the paper. I am so glad the long ago days of windshield scraping are gone. Now I just wait. The snow has melted on the shoveled and plowed surfaces. My walkway and car are clear. The back stairs are also clear. I threw de-icer on them so the dogs won’t slip. 

I have a few uke events this week, but today I am going nowhere. I’m staying cozy and warm. In fact, I actually fell asleep under the afghan for a bit this morning. The dogs joined me. It is already that sort of day.

When I was a kid, I never really minded the cold. My mother made sure that when I went out I was layered and bundled. My school was old. It had tall windows and hissing radiators. It was never really warm. I always wore a sweater over my uniform. I wore knee socks. 

I loved when my mother gave me soup for lunch. The thermos kept it hot. I remember having chicken noodle, Campbell’s chicken noodle, only Campbell’s, and she always packed Saltines. I learned to be careful filling the thermos cup. Noodles tended to plop and spray soup. I remember lots of noodles and little squares of chicken. 

We always had crayons around the house. My mother and I would sit at the kitchen table or on the rug to color together. She colored the best. She could shade the crayons. My colors were all blunt. I’d always get new crayons for Christmas and sometimes in my Easter basket. At first, I’d keep them in the crayon box. If the box came with a sharpener, I’d keep a tip on the crayons.  When the crayons got smaller, I’d have to peel off the labels, no more exotic colors, just red or blue or green. A cigar box was where we kept all the small crayons. I have a few boxes of souvenir crayons. One is in a tin and has all the colors, even the discontinued colors. The other night I saw a commercial for Crayola. They have a new commemorative box of just discontinued colors. I think I need that box.

The snow started round 12 or 12:30. It came quickly, but when I woke up, I found we had less snow than I expected, maybe only 3 inches. While my coffee was brewing, I went to get the paper. It was on the front step. Someone had shoveled my walkway. A bit later Henry started barking. When I checked, my neighbor was snow-blowing my car free. I went out to thank him. He asked if he could do anything else. I said you have already done so much. All that was left for me was to clear the snow off my car. When I looked later, the car was clear of snow, and all around it in the driveway was also clear. I’m so very thankful for the kindness of my neighbor. I’m thinking maybe I should bake cookies as a thanks. 

We are expecting more snow on Wednesday and Saturday, but the Saturday snow will be followed by rain. I always think rain pocked snow is the ugliest snow. It makes for slush and then it freezes.

When I was a kid, I would have been so disappointed by this storm because the snow fell on a Saturday night so no snow day. 

We always had the best best Sunday dinners. We’d have a roast beef or a roast chicken, gravy, mashed potatoes and a couple of vegetables. I was always partial to baby peas. I’d press down the center of my mashed potatoes to make a well. That’s where the gravy went. I’d keep shoring up the potatoes to make sure the gravy never flowed over the sides. That was my dinner challenge. Sometimes I’d mix the peas with the potatoes. It was ugly but delicious. That meal was my favorite dinner and the last Sunday dinner I had with the family the day I left for Peace Corps staging

Potatoes, carrots and summer corn on the cob were the only fresh vegetables we ate. Mostly we had canned veggies. I wasn’t a fan of carrots, but I loved potatoes. They were always mashed which my father loved. He’d put a slab of butter on the top of his potatoes where it would melt and pool, a bit like my gravy. He loved canned asparagus. I always thought it was gross. The green was an odd color, and the spears bent in the middle.

 I’ve watched so many movies where the driver is chatting with his passengers and not even looking at the road ahead, and there is never an accident. I want that car.

The wind is strong. Even the highest scrub pine branches are swaying. The sky is a light blue. It is warm and sunny, 41° warm. That’s a good thing as last night got cold and everything is icy. I had to take minced steps to keep from falling when I got the paper and the mail. Tomorrow we’ll have snow as many as 5 inches. Mother Nature is gaslighting us again.

When I was a kid, I loved the snow, even if we didn’t have a snow day. I’d sled all day if I could. I remember my mittens would get clumps of snow stuck to the wool. The mittens would get heavy and flop from the weight. I’d shake them but the clumps stuck. When I went inside, I’d put my mittens on the radiator to dry. They steamed.

My favorite comfort food back then was tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. The soup was thick. The sandwich oozed Velvetta. The bread, Wonder Bread of course, was browned in the frying pan, a cask iron pan. Dunking the sandwich was the best part. 

I remember the lunch boxes we’d buy every fall for the new school year. They were character lunch boxes. I remember my Mickey Mouse Club lunch box. The Musketeers were wearing their talent roundup cowboy clothes. My brother had Davy Crockett. When I was in the fourth grade, my lunch box had a tartan design. I had grown passed characters. In another year or two I didn’t use lunchboxes. I used brown paper bags.

We walked everywhere, to school and back and all over town on the weekends. Back then, most families had only one car. My father took ours to work every day. My mother didn’t drive. She grocery shopped on Friday nights so my father could take her. If she needed something during the week, she’d send one of us to the corner store. Mostly it was for bread and milk. 

Walking in the rain to school was the worst. My hair would get wet, and my shoes would bubble at the toes from all the water. I’d take a while to dry. In the afternoon, cars would line up to collect kids. I’d hope for a neighbor in the line. Usually there wasn’t. I’d get home and put my shoes under the radiator to dry. They always got stiff and would curl. 

Walking in the snow was magical. I’d look up to watch the flakes and would catch some with my tongue. I’d run and slide on the sidewalk and leave skid marks. We’d have a contest to see who could slide the furthest. Falling disqualified you. I was often disqualified. 

When I woke up, it was snowing. I made coffee then ran out to the deck and filled 3 of the bird feeders. I’d been meaning to do that for the last few days, but I guess I was waiting for cold and snow, as if. I didn’t grab a jacket, but it was warmer than I expected. The dogs joined me. While I was filling the feeders, they were playing on the deck. Well, the snow has already stopped. We have a dusting. 

My father bought my mother a hi-fi with his bonus money one year. I remember the turntable was in a sort of a case with a top which you lifted to play the records. I remember how carefully you had to place the arm on the record in the exact right spot where the grooves started. I remember the stack of records my mother had. One was Judy Garland, another Frank Sinatra. I know all the lyrics to Shrimp Boats. Sometimes the records got scratches and would skip or get stuck in one groove.

 I used to play my 45’s. First I chose 45 RPM on the speed selector knob. Next, I had to place a plastic disc in the hole in the middle of the records so they would fit the spindle. My friend had a turntable just for 45’s which I envied. It had a record changer in the middle, and you could stack 45’s records on it which then played in turn. I remember sitting on the floor holding the record in the middle and on the edge so as not to leave fingerprints while I was going through the pile of records, A and B sides. 

I still have a record collection of both 33 1/3’s and 45’s. I also have a few plastic discs for the 45’s. I keep those records stored in boxes just for 45’s. Every now and then I go through the boxes and pick a few songs to play. My 33 1/3 records go back to the 60’s when I bought my first album. I still love playing those, especially the oldest albums. The other day I listened to Gail Garnett and her album with We’ll Sing in the Sunshine.

I wish the same part of my brain which stores lyrics to all the songs I’ve loved would work for other things like names or dates. They take a while to retrieve. When my friend Peg and I are talking and we’ve forgotten something, the two of us try to figure out what word we mean. Sometimes we remember. Other times we don’t even get close, but ask me to sing the lyrics to songs I love, and I remember every verse.

My dance card has one last entry for the week, a uke concert tomorrow. 

We had a bit of snow last night, under an inch. Right now it is melting as it is 38°. The blue sky and the cloudy sky are taking turns. The weatherman calls it partly cloudy. I lean more toward the sun.

The only remains of Christmas are the trees. The dining room tree, a scrub pine, is still here upstairs because it is awkward to carry down to the cellar where it stays up and decorated. The tree is in two parts so I have to put one hand on each part when I take it down the stairs to the cellar. I go slowly, quite slowly. Stairs and I have a contentious relationship. The living room tree is in its plastic tree bag in the middle of the room. It is heavy to carry. I’ll give it a go today and then leave it upright in the yard so the birds can have a bit of shelter. 

When I was a kid, I loved to watch the snow fall. I wasn’t partial to big, wet flakes as I knew they wouldn’t last long. They carried no hope for a snow day. It was the smaller flakes which carried expectations. I remember watching the snow from the front picture window. The flakes were lit by the streetlight on the sidewalk in the front of my house. Sometimes the wind was strong enough to slant the flakes sideways. I’d keep checking to see if the snow was accumulating. When the sidewalks and the street disappeared, I was hopeful. The next morning, if the snow had been heavy and constant, we’d listen for the no school code from the fire department alarm. 

Geography was a favorite subject. I dreamed of seeing all those places in real life, and I was lucky. I got to see many. My favorite, of course, is Africa. How could it not be? It was exotic and wonderful. It was my home for two years, and I loved every day. The camel ride in the Sahara is high on the list. I wasn’t delighted when the camel took off on me, and I nearly fell off, but now it is a great story, even a bit dramatic. Standing on the Equator in each hemisphere is on the list. I saw the Andes before I saw the Rocky Mountains. On Corcovado in Rio I stood below the statue of Christ. I remembered the picture in my geography book.

Europe too is memorable but describing my favorite places would take more than a few musings. I’ll save that for a slow day when my muses have taken an unauthorized hiatus. 

Uke is back this week with practice, a lesson and a concert on Friday. The book for February is love songs of the 60’s, one of my favorite books. I’ll wear a heart sweatshirt, my heart fascinator and red Chuck Taylor high tops. 

Finally, my dance card is no longer empty.