I've Got Plenty of Nothing

It’s one week into 2010, but I have very little to write that anyone other than poor, pitiful me would like to read, because my thoughts aren’t very interesting or newsworthy in the winter. They abound in the spring and summer, start falling off in November, then die out completely in January, because…drum roll... I’m a bona fide winter hater.

I haven’t written since December because I am convinced that only other haters like me would want to read about why I hate living in ice-cold New England in January and February (and sometimes March). Who but another winter-hater would care that I can’t plan anything, because I worry it might snow or ice up and the roads‘ll get slippery and cancel all activities? How I hate that it’s dark when I wake up, dark again at 4:45, and darker, still, in general? How it’s so dry inside that I have to slather anti-skin-crack cream on my heels and thumbs? How my scalp itches and flakes so much I can’t wear my beloved black because of schmutz fallout? How the wood and paint on all the woodwork in my house is cracking? Why the heat seems to be on more than off (or how much oil costs - a fortune)? How my car is covered in salt and rime, but if I take it to the carwash, my hands’ll get chapped after I dry it off, then the temperature will fall just enough to melt the ice and filth up that just-cleaned and dried car and I’ll have to start all over again?

See, I told you that you wouldn’t want to read about my day-in-and-day-out, once-the-temperature-drop-into-the-teens-I’m-a-mess winter-hating, even if I try to make it sound like I’m just a crazy crank or explain it away, like I do, most often to complete strangers (since everyone I know learns to avoid me from January 1^st to March 1^st). Who but a stranger (or another winter-hater) would want to hear me describe in vivid detail how cold and miserable I am, how I hate, hate, hate snow, how I have to rub my hands together (it feels so handwringingly effective) like I’m Lady Macbeth, or how chapped my lips are, because no product out there blocks that freaking wind chill?

You winter-loving people out there, and I know you outnumber me – I am writing down this stuff so you’ll read my pain and weep…err - empathize. Please?

Oh dear. I should’ve kept all this to myself, right? I should’ve just detailed, instead, how I’m knitting an interesting Dofuku jacket, watching hours of UConn basketball on TV, reading (but nothing worth mentioning…yet), cooking the usual repertoire (unlike my daughter, who’s turned into an updated Cook’s Illustrated), catching up on a few new movies (Up In The Air, Invictus, and It’s Complicated, La Danse), planning a short trip to NYC (here I come, Jane Austen, get ready for me to check you out at the Morgan Library), exercising, or planning to tutor elementary kids in Hartford.

But – don’t you know? It’s so much more fun to winter-bash, because it warms my heart and gets my blood boiling. Keeps me on my icy-cold toes, and stokes that brrr-ning, brrr-ning, yearning feeling inside me. Oh, yes it does.