In Praise of Winter

The north wind doth blow,
And we will have snow,
And what will poor robin do then, poor thing?

He'll fly to the barn
To keep himself warm
And hide his head under his wing ... poor thing!

This little ditty is one of my favorites. I think about it when I look out the window at all the robins who should have flown south, but didn't.

What do you think of winter? I stand in hearty favor of the season, myself. Given the choice between high summer and deep winter, I will choose deep winter every time. The recent polar vortex tested my resolve, but in the end it exited much quicker than a heat wave.

In the cold weather, you can bundle on layer upon layer. In the summertime, there's only so much clothing you can take off, and then you're just naked and hot. Being hot makes me irritable. Quickly. Being cold makes me cheerful, mostly. And it's ever so much more rewarding to have cold feet that slowly become warm than to have hot feet that slowly become cold.

We have a wood-burning fireplace here at Chateau Johnson. So far this season we have gone through almost a whole cord of firewood. I have toted every last log of it indoors (and I helped stack it last summer, too). Mr. J has back problems, and Heir works her butt off. I lug logs. Except for the fact that the path between the woodpile and the cellar door is solid ice, I don't mind the firewood chore. That's because I'm down with winter.

The part of the world where I live is prone to bad ice storms that cause widespread power outages. We had just such a storm last week, and even now some people don't have their power back. I see the potential for a power outage as the one down side of winter. If we get a prolonged power failure here at the Chateau, I can keep one room warm with the fireplace, but Decibel would have to bunk in the room with all the rest of us ... and still we would be very cold.

When I hear about the potential for a major ice event, I kick into woodpile overdrive. The last thing you want to do in a winter power failure is go outside to bring in fuel. I've got about 1/8 cord in the basement right now, just in case.

Snow is pretty, cold temperatures are bracing, and there's immense comfort in a cup of hot cocoa, a crackling fire, and a fleecy throw. My indoor cats loll near the fire, Decibel pouts (quietly), and the outdoor tom seems to have settled into his lean-to, which is now waterproofed.

All hail the bored Goddess Sedna of winter! She's popping in later for spaghetti and pemmican. If you have any season-related petitions for her, fling them into the comments.

This too shall pass.