Posted tagged ‘rainy day’

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“Winter is not a season, it’s an occupation.”

January 4, 2015

Happily it isn’t snow. Last night it poured, and it’s still raining. Dreary is the best description for today and most of last week. The sun appeared one day but brought no warmth, just light, though I was thankful for the light.

My adventures have been limited. Actually, they have been non-existent. Staying inside warm and cozy is pretty much my whole day. You’d think I’d be busy putting away my Christmas stuff but it is still sitting on the couch, and my usual obsession with putting things away has been buried, deeply buried. I did get out of the house yesterday to do my errands. I even found a parking spot near CVS, but that should have been a red flag. When I got inside, I became the 9th person in line at the pharmacy. It got as long as 12. The dump run was the same as it usually is with its three stops, the last being the trash, though I didn’t meet anyone I know, an unusual occurrence. Agway was the last stop, and I filled my trunk with huge bags of pine litter and dry dog food, canned dog food, canned cat food and dog and cat treats. These animals eat better than I do.

When I wake up, I have to remember which day of the week it is as they are all pretty much lumped together with little to differentiate them. By the time I get up, I’ve usually figured out the day by remembering the day before. I have PT sessions twice a week and plan my errands for the same days. I guess I’d have to describe myself as half-hibernated or to use the rhyming names: semi, hemi or demi-hibernated. I’m still working on the name but leaning toward semi. Maybe I’ll give it more thought just before my afternoon nap.

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“Christmas time! That man must be a misanthrope indeed, in whose breast something like a jovial feeling is not roused— in whose mind some pleasant associations are not awakened— by the recurrence of

December 25, 2014

Merry Christmas!

I woke up to a dark, rainy day yet again, but I remembered right away it was Christmas, and the day got brighter. Both trees are lit and both look beautiful. The one in the living room, the real tree, is still surrounded by presents I haven’t yet opened. That will come next, when I finish here. I find my restraint remarkable.

Christmas Eve was great fun. We drank egg nog and ate appetizers but mostly we worked on our gingerbread houses. We each had a kit with house parts and some candies for decoration. Clare added different candies and off we went. The frosting was sticky and my fingers were covered. Some bits fell on the floor as the frosting hardened quickly. This year, while the walls of the houses were drying, we decorated. We laughed when colored round candies hit the floor, bounced and then rolled, and there were several. Gum drops, we found out, needed lots of frosting. We landscaped. The last step was for us to attach the roof parts. We each had two pieces. Mine caused the walls to collapse, a construction set back, but I added icing and reconnected the house. It dried, and I gingerly added the roof, and it stuck. The three of us created masterpieces. They are the best houses yet.

When I was a kid, the first look at the tree on Christmas morning was jaw dropping. It was lit and surrounded by presents. It always looked brighter and taller on Christmas morning. I had to stand just a second on the stairs to marvel then I went to my spot, my special present spot under the tree. We each had one, and it never changed over all the years.

We’d take turns opening up a gift so could watch each other open. The stockings were the only exception. There we were on our own though neat stuff was held up for everybody to see. Stockings always had neat stuff. My mother was a stocking maven.

We’d play a while then go to church for Christmas mass. Because my parents went at midnight, my brother and I walked and went together. Mostly we went to early masses which were quick and had no sermon. It was just the old ladies and us.

Dinner was always a roast of some kind, usually roast beef, which we didn’t have often. Mashed potatoes and gravy were a necessity. Only the vegetables could change from year to year. After dinner we did whatever. Mostly we played near the tree. Sometimes I’d start a new book. For supper we had hot roast beef sandwiches covered in gravy. My mother always toasted the bread first.

We went to bed early on Christmas, exhausted by the festivities of the day. It was always a special day filled with surprises.

I love Christmas still and take joy out of finding neat stuff, the kind you hold up to show, for bags and stockings. Speaking of bags and stockings, I’m done here. Merry Christmas!

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“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.”

December 24, 2014

It’s raining, and it’s 50˚, but none of that matters. It’s Christmas Eve. When I was a kid, it was the longest day of the year. The clock never seemed to move. I remember begging my mother to let me go to bed around six or seven. Tired had nothing to do with it. I was filled with anticipation, and I remember believing sleeping the night away was the quickest way to get to morning and to Santa’s surprises. It, of course, was always the one night I could never get to sleep. I remember having conversations with my brother down the hall while both of us were still in bed in our own rooms. Periodically my mother would yell up the stairs for us to stop talking so we could go to sleep. I used to wonder why she didn’t realize sleep was far away on Christmas Eve. Hers was a silly request.

Every year my mother put a few presents under the tree. Every year my sister Moe poked tiny holes in each present to see what was there. It was during these hole poking days she developed an aptitude for guessing exactly what each wrapped present was. Holes were no longer necessary. One Christmas is legendary. She was going to a Christmas party with Rod, my brother-in-law, and had nothing to wear. She felt a few presents from my parents and found her outfit, felt a few more and found new earrings to match her dress. She called to thank my mother who then became the tale bearer of my sister’s latest Christmas miracle.

We could open one present on Christmas Eve, but we never got to pick the present. We always had to open the pajamas. New pajamas were part of our Christmas tradition.

I can still see the tree at 16 Washington Ave. in its usual corner with the wrapped gifts underneath, the ones from my parents and grandparents, the ones with the tiny holes. The lights in the windows seemed especially brilliant on Christmas Eve. TV Santa, the one from New Hampshire we watched every afternoon, wished us a Merry Christmas, waved and left for his big adventure around the world. We hung our stockings on the railing going upstairs. We had no chimney. We watched a Christmas show or two on TV then we went to bed. Eons later we all fell asleep.

Today is still all about tradition. This morning I opened number 24 on my Advent calendar. It is the crèche scene, the same as it always is. This afternoon I will work on tomorrow’s dinner, and tonight my friends and I will build gingerbread houses, eat some appies and have a drink or two. That’s one of our favorite Christmas traditions.

Happy Christmas Eve! I hope you’re all on the good list.

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“The sun did not shine. It was too wet to play. So we sat in the house. All that cold, cold, wet day.”

October 11, 2014

It was a mirror under the nose morning as I slept until after ten. I always wonder if my neighbors will notice my paper still sits in the driveway so late and hope I’m okay or if they’ll just shake their heads and think that woman sleeps really late. I know they are up before seven every morning.

It’s raining. The house is dark, and I haven’t turned on any lights. The dog and cats are sleeping, the cats in here with me and the dog in her crate. She and I are going to the dump today because I figure the rain will keep people away, and tomorrow will be a madhouse as the dump is closed Mondays and Tuesdays.

Rainy Saturdays this time of year were the worst when I was a kid. It was too chilly to be outside playing in the rain, and there wasn’t a whole lot to do in the house. We could watch TV, play board games or read, and we’d try each until we were bored enough to move on to another. We often ended up fighting over the board game. It was always a he said-she said argument or accusations of cheating, and my mother would yell for us to put the game away. Most times I’d lie in bed and read. It was one of the few places where I could be by myself. I figure rainy Saturdays drove my mother crazy because she was stuck with the four of us, and we were stuck with each other. My father was usually off doing his Saturday stuff. When I think back, my mother was always around while my father worked until late every day and on Saturdays he was off doing his errands and then he’d worked outside in the yard. Sunday was the only day he was around the whole time except he went to an early mass where he was an usher. Once in a while we went with him, but it was really early.

My mother was the disciplinarian when my father wasn’t around. He was always the threat, “If you don’t stop what you’re doing, I’m telling your father.” That scared us. My mother was easy-going while my father wasn’t. We usually stopped. She never did tell.

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“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.”

October 4, 2014

The sun is still among the missing. Posters have been put up asking people to keep an eye out in case it should appear. The misty rain comes and goes. Gracie has left wet paw prints all over the kitchen floor. The cats are sleeping; of course, they are.

It is getting closer and closer to the end of deck time. Soon all the furniture will be covered and all the flower pots emptied. It makes me sad to know that Saturday night movies are over, they’ll no more reading outside and no more sitting by candlelight at night listening to the wonderful sounds of summer. The leaves are slowly turning, but the deck has debris from the rain: sticks, leaves and acorns. It already looks deserted.

English grammar has clear rules. Like math or even music, there is a right answer or a right tune. People hop all over singers out of tune. They complain about the stupidity of cashiers who need cash registers to tell them the amount of change because they can’t figure it out themselves. Correcting English, though, isn’t acceptable. The reason for this I’m told is communication. It is people understanding each other no matter how they say it. I accept that popular usage has changed a few of the rules like the one where hopefully used to be an adverb, but objects of prepositions haven’t changed at all. On the news the other night I heard the reporter say something like the witness told he and I. That mistake was okayed by the writer, the editor and the reporter who probably shouldn’t be blamed as she just read the news handed to her. Is it too much to ask that we speak our mother tongue correctly? Obviously it is, but don’t you dare sing out of tune or you’ll be excoriated in the newspapers and, worst of all, in social media.

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“Cleanliness and order are not matters of instinct; they are matters of education, and like most great things, you must cultivate a taste for them.”

July 14, 2014

Last night the weather woman predicted a polar vortex. She was describing summer temperatures in the mid to low 60’s. I guess polar was about the best adjective she could find to describe the cool, even cold, summer days and nights. Right now, though, it is oppressively humid and totally still. I feel closed in, surrounded by the thick air. I swear I can even see it.

Gracie and I are going to the dump today. Sunday, our usual day, is, in the summer, the worst day to go. I know. I’ve been there. Cars are lined up at the gate waiting to get in, and there are no parking spots near the trash or the recycle bins. I just hope the predicted rain holds off. My luck is usually such that just as I’m arriving at the dump the skies open and the deluge begins.

I don’t remember staying in the house any day, especially on a rainy day, when I was a kid. Rainy days were fun. We’d find the biggest puddles, jump in and send sprays of water all around us soaking ourselves at the same time. We’d walk barefooted in the gutters filled with rainwater splashing and kicking water as we went. If the rain was heavy, the water ran quickly through the gutters to the sewers. We’d float leaves or pieces of bark and run along side to watch them fly through the water until our makeshift boats disappeared in the sewer grate. Then we’d go back and do it again.

I never minded getting wet or dirty when I was young. My standards for cleanliness were low. Sometimes I’d even go to bed in the clothes I had worn that day. It just seemed easier. Now I carry wet naps in my bag and in the car. I wear gloves when I pot  plants or when I’m in the garden. I carry a Tide pen in case of spills. My standards now are quite high. I think that is one of the burdens of adulthood.

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“Part of the urge to explore is a desire to become lost.”

June 14, 2014

The rain has stopped but the day is still damp and cloudy. There is such an after storm stillness that even the leaves aren’t moving. I was on the deck for a bit this morning and was surprised by how warm a morning it is. Today is a free day. I have no lists.

When I was a kid, we roamed a lot on Saturdays. On days like today my sneakers and the bottom part of my dungarees would get soaked. I never cared. The best part of being a kid was needing no sense of style or fashion. Dirt was acceptable. Fields and woods were for exploring, and rain was never a deterrent, at least not misty rain or, as my mother called it, spitting rain. The leaves always glistened when it rained, and I remember slurping rainwater from the leaves when I got thirsty. We wandered far afield usually staying in the woods or along the railroad tracks. Once we found a raft and used it to pole around a pond. The raft was made from an odd combination of wood pieces, and there were holes between the pieces so our feet were always in water. We poled a couple of times around the pond and then put the raft back where we had found it. At the swamp, we jumped across the little canals from one island to another and went as far back as we could until the underbrush was too thick and there were thorns. It was only in the winter that we could follow the swamp to where it ended.

My town had a box factory and two factories which made chemicals and all three of those factories were by the railroad tracks. We used to see the people from the box factory on their breaks. They’d be sitting outside on the steps talking together and smoking cigarettes. The factory was at the end of the tracks near what used to be the station. The windows were too high for us to see what was going on, but there were piles of unfolded boxes stacked on the loading dock. Two railroad cars were always on the tracks across from the factory. They never moved, and I don’t think they were ever used for anything. We couldn’t get into them but we did climb the steps and look wistfully inside.

We were gone all day, but my mother never worried even though she didn’t know where we were. When we were leaving, she’d ask where we were going. We never knew so our answer was always,”Around.”

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“Our brightest blazes of gladness are commonly kindled by unexpected sparks.”

April 5, 2013

The day is gray and rainy. Good thing I have no errands so I can just hang around and do house stuff. Yesterday I had three errands including my eye exam, the last of the yearly doctors’ visits. Unless I break or tear something open, I don’t have to see another doctor until next year. I do need a cat scan on my back which has been really bad for the last couple of weeks. I’m still a pretzel when I walk. I had to turn down working the marathon this year. I knew it would be too much. The cat scan is next week.

I don’t know what has happened to spontaneity. When I was a kid, it ruled our lives. We had school all week and church on Sunday, but the rest of the time was there for us to do whatever we wanted, most times on the spurn of the moment. Mention doing something now and people pull out calendars, and it seems to take forever to find a mutually free day. I remember the doorbell ringing around 2 one morning. It was my friend and her husband. His first homegrown tomatoes were ripe, and they were inviting me right then and there for BLT’s. I ran upstairs and got dressed. Another time I heard honking, and I went outside to find out what was going on. A couple of my friends were there who said, “Let’s go!” I grabbed my bag and went. I didn’t even ask where. Part of the fun was not knowing.

My friends and I have these wonderful theme parties, but they have to be planned. What is Cowboy Day without the right ten gallon hat and chuck wagon food? No skulls to decorate for Day of the Dead? What are you thinking? Chinese New Year means chop sticks and the right decorations. You can’t use a tiger during the year of the pig. I love all our parties, but just once I’d like to knock on doors, wake up my friends and invite them to a surprise, but I don’t dare. I expect they’d be a bit unnerved at the door bell ringing and maybe even upset, annoyed or angry at the intrusion and at being woken up. Twenty years ago I wouldn’t have hesitated. We were all a lot more flexible back then and there was nothing neater than a surprise. Now the best thing is a good night’s sleep. That’s too bad. Surprises are great fun.

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“Happily we bask in this warm September sun, Which illuminates all creatures…”

September 23, 2012

It must have rained during the night as the street and driveway are wet, but I never heard the rain. The morning is warm. The sun rose without being seen, hidden as it is behind clouds. I went to bed really early and woke up in the dark. I can’t seem to shake the last time zone. My newspapers aren’t even here yet.

This is my favorite time of the year. The Cape stays warm. Red leaves dominate the trees, the scrub oaks, which are everywhere. Tourists are gone for the most part. The weekends, though, will still be a bit busy through Columbus Day when the Cape closes up for the season.

This is also the tour bus season, and every bus is filled with senior citizens taking advantage of the off-season rates, the still open souvenir shops and the all you can eat restaurants. The buses pass me as they go down cape, and I can usually see the tour guide standing in front with microphone in hand. On Route 6A, I figure the guide is describing the captains’ houses and places like the Edward Gorey house. That is the prettiest road on the whole cape, and it extends from the bridge to Orleans. I usually take that road when I’m going down cape.

I need to buy some mums. I noticed they are blooming in my front garden, and I think I’ll add a couple of different colors. The mums always seem like the last gift of the season from my garden, the memory I’ll hold onto until spring.

I have a wonderful memory. I can see things as they are and how they used to be. I was giving directions to my friend and told her exactly how many lights she’d go through: seven of them. I just closed my eyes and saw the road and each light. I have the worst accent when it comes to languages, but I remember the vocabulary, even my high school French. I may mangle the sounds, but I get my point across.

Nothing tastes better than sweet, fresh fruit. Pineapple is my favorite, but the paw paw in Ghana I ate this trip moved up to a close second. I keep bananas around for a quick snack. I love them in my cereal. They even perk up corn flakes. Cold, crisp apples scream of fall, but it’s pumpkins which are fall’s best fruit. They stand out in every farm shop usually lined up in the front inviting us to stop. I always do.

 

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“No day is so bad it can’t be fixed with a nap.”

June 18, 2012

Okay, today is like yesterday which is like the day before. It is cloudy and cool. Gracie woke me up at eight which to me was the middle of the night as I didn’t go to bed until after two. She was barking loud enough to wake the neighbors so I went downstairs where she was standing by the front door. I opened it, but nothing was there. I let her out back into the yard, and there was a dog outside the fence who started barking at Gracie who then tried to jump the six foot fence to get at the interloper. Gracie was as fierce as I’d ever heard her, and she managed to get her front paws on the top of the fence but, luckily, never made it over. When she came on the deck to get a better look, I grabbed her and brought her inside. The dog took off through the yard behind mine. I kept Gracie in the house, drank my morning coffee and read the papers. When I finished, I started my morning chores. I went upstairs and changed the cat litter then was going to change the bed before my shower, but I decided the bed looked inviting, and I was tired so I went back to sleep for another two hours.  I just woke up.

I like naps. Even when I was in college, I took naps so age is not a factor. My father was a napper so I am from a line of nappers. My favorites are winter naps in the cold darkness of the late afternoon while I’m snuggled under the down comforter with the animals beside me keeping me even warmer. Rainy day naps are a close second, and I love to fall asleep to the rhythmic sounds of drops falling on the  overhang below the roof right outside my window. My friend Jay calls it his nippy nap. I always liked that. His wife is not a napper, but she understands naps. My sisters, who are also not nappers, don’t understand the lure of the nap. My mother never did either, but my father did.

I have no agenda for the day other than finish those chores and do a laundry then I’m going to read for the rest of the afternoon. I think it sounds like a wonderful day!

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