Winter Storm Warnings

Winter arrived yesterday – not unusual to receive the first real snowfall of the year in mid-November – but what was unusual was that we got 6 inches of the white stuff all at once – instant Christmas Card! Luckily we took advantage of the storm warning to prepare: a stop at Costco for enough food to last until Spring; a stop at the liquor store in case we are actually all stuck inside together for any extended period of time; time spent Friday night getting the backyard rink ready; and a little bit of forethought yesterday to hang the garland and lights on the front of the house.  Nothing like a warning from Mother Nature to get you moving.

So the outside looks like Christmas – the inside? Not so much.  The last of the Fall and Halloween decorations have just been put away, and the chaos that is our slowly-being-renovated-house ensures Better Homes and Gardens will not be stopping by any time soon to do that photo-shoot.  The additional hour this week thanks to the time change was barely felt, and we have a list of to-do’s a mile long that we want to tackle, but time seems to escape us – work, school, the boy’s hockey schedule: it blurs together and before you know it another month has passed and you find yourself pretty much where you were 6 or 8 weeks earlier. Only older.

Life happens.  And it doesn’t wait until you’re ready. Ask the East Coast.  Or better yet, just look outside. We know winter will come – it’s no surprise given where we live – this isn’t Texas – it’s always a matter of when.  This year it was yesterday and we were mostly ready, maybe not with all the little details like draining the gas and putting the lawn mower away for the winter; or that one final clean of the shed and putting away the last of the planters and pots which are now buried by the gazebo deck. But we did enough while we had the time to be able to sit down today and feel content with where we are.

There’s change on the horizon – change in all sorts of places. I’m giving you fair warning now that it’s there, waiting for me, waiting for me to accept that it will come and when it does things will have to adjust around here to suit.  And that’s okay.  I’m making my peace with that.  Looking forward to it actually, needing it in many ways.  You’ll hear more about that in the weeks and months to come – but suffice it to say one of the reasons I haven’t been ‘here’ much the past few months is also one of the forces pushing things forward.

We resist change pretty well – I think we’re taught that that skill at a young age – to push back and hold on to things the way they are currently instead of feeling the natural ebb and flow of time and accepting the current of the stream as it carries us along.  Not sure if that’s our ego thinking it’s in charge and able to finally have control by making time stand still, or if it’s the common human tie that binds us all – facing the reality that we too are mortal and will someday pass.  Some people really struggle with that idea, that they won’t be around forever – they dismiss it entirely and live with a fear constantly a palpable part of their days, a fear that drives them.  A fear that consumes them quietly inside, gnawing and eating at them, cloaked in illness or mental health issues, or maybe in that classic catch-all ‘stress’ – its all the same; its one emotion pushing the buttons and until it’s met and looked at clearly with no assumptions and no illusions, it will continue to run the show.

But if it’s uncovered and examined for what it really is, that emotion is a pretty harmless thing – it’s a survival mechanism of sorts alerting us to immediate or certain dangers – helpful tools when we lived off the land like wild animals – not always terrible useful now that we’ve seemingly mastered our environment – but in that definition of “alerting us to immediate or certain danger” we can find the seeds of why so many of us fail to act or refuse to accept the inevitable – the danger isn’t immediate enough to force us to change.  It’s off in the distance, like retirement or old age – ideas to a child that seem fuzzy and cloudy, not in any need of clarity or processing because they are so far away in time from the here and now.  But time is sneaky that way.  These eyes still see the world with the memory of that child, and that teen, and it is easy to pretend we aren’t who we are becoming.  But the signs are there – more of them everyday – if we’re willing to slow down and pay attention.

It’s November, it’s snowed and it’s giving me a chance to sit here and reflect while looking forward.  A reminder today that we all have time enough to do what needs to be done now, to be able to sit down later and feel content with where we are.  Now help me shovel the driveway…