It's nine degrees outside, a veritable heatwave compared to this morning's minus three. Still, the idea of leaving the house evades me. As much as I would love to venture out of my current state of cabin fever, the warmth of my home calls me back to reality. I'm amazed at how comfortable our one hundred and twelve year-old house feels during this windchill record-breaking winter. Actually, there is one tiny room that, when the door is closed, is rather toasty. It's the bathroom, and it's on the second floor, in the middle of the landing.
With summer oldies playing on my radio, beach glass and sand photos on the walls, and the door shut tight to keep the heat from escaping, this half-bath has become a place to linger, especially now. Before yesterday, there were no windows in my heated hide-away and no way to put one in, until my husband and I thought "out of the box". Box describes it well, with dimensions of 5' x 5', this little oasis needed a way to seem less cramped. We had noticed an old door in the garage that may have been the back door to our house decades ago. It has a large window on the top half. Would it fit upstairs? Would it look silly? Well, to make a long story short, we trimmed a couple of inches off the door, cleaned and painted it, and added a latch. With a pull-down shade attached to the inside, above the window, there is privacy when closed and the illusion of more space and additional light when open. The yellow paint on the door makes the room appear warmer, too, and it doesn't look a bit funny, just sunny.
According to the radio, it is now ten degrees outside, and I don't even care. I'm brushing my teeth, and you know where.
No, the window doesn't look like this, but it is made out of glass, so this photo was a good choice for today. It's called, "Sea Glass with Poster Edges".
Now and then, I am persuaded to do something that I don't want to do---go to the local video store. Instead of enjoying the perusal of titles for a cozy night of movies at home, I feel like I need a pair of blinders as I go down the isles to keep me from seeing the blood and gore that I'd rather ignore. Ugh! If there was a contest for the sickest, scariest, dvd covers, it would end up in a two-hundred-way tie. Whether it's pictures of brightly colored body fluids, Satanic eyes, or sexually suggestive themes, to me, they all rank off the scale in shock value. Apparently, that's what some people want, but I don't. I can't "unsee" what I've seen, and those visions in my head are compounded by the realization that, somewhere, there are small children viewing those movies. It's true. Time after time, my students at school would relate parts of such horrors to their classmates and me.
My commentary on brain-trash could go on forever, so I'll just go where I was headed in the first place. One of my favorite books is Lynn Vincent and Todd Burpo's Heaven is for Real. Imagine how thrilled I was to see a movie preview for that story! Finally, a film of substance that will change lives for the better, and it's coming to theaters! If you haven't read the book, I hope you will. Four-year-old Colton's story about going to Heaven during an emergency surgery is precious. In a world full of negative images, the time has come for this story to be on the big screen. I pray the success of this movie will make it available everywhere.
"Searching for the Light" seemed like a good pairing for today's subject. I hope you like it.
As you can see, these beach treasures have been sprayed with water. To see why I've paired this picture with today's post, read below.
There were five buckets scattered, yet strategically placed, through the upstairs hallway. As I made my way from one end to the other, these obstacles reminded me of the bumpers of a pinball machine that would "ding" every time a steel ball would make contact with them. I was the steel ball, but I wasn't trying to score points. I was simply on my way to a classroom to substitute for the teacher who would be gone for the day. The buckets contained a blonde ale-colored substance, and if this were a brewery, that would be fine, but it's a school, and the liquid was dirty water from a leaky roof.
Growing up, my school district consisted of six buildings; two of them remain and the others are gone. The leak-buckets were an unwanted reminder of the destruction of my childhood home away from home. I can only hope that a leaky roof is not an indication of the same kind of outcome for the school building where I sub. After all, being retired from teaching doesn't mean I've quit. I still care. I still want the best for the kids who count on the grown-ups to take good care of them. Without an adequate building, how can that happen? Truth is, this winter has been hard on structures everywhere, and I'm sure the one I was in last Wednesday is solid. Experience has shown me, though, that no matter how much I have come to care about a place, others may not feel the same way, and even if they do, the lack of funds usually results in the death of a beloved building. If you've ever looked upon the vacant land where your school once thrived, you know how that feels. Personally, it makes me hope my memory never fails me as I tuck the stories and images of "Remember when..." away until I need to visit them. Needless to say, after a day of walking around buckets, I took Memory Lane all the way home.
To purchase an e-book of my poem, "Like Sea Glass", complete with pictures, for $1.99, go to http://store.blurb.com/ebooks/460074-like-sea-glass-its-journey-and-ours . (There are 38 pages, with a free 11-page preview.)
There's no need to belong to a gym when you live along the shoreline of Lake Michigan, and not for reasons you might think. My house is about a mile away from the beach, so naturally, you'd assume that I am referring to summer walks, but I'm not. What it all boils down to is the three-word phrase heard too many times this winter, "lake effect snow". Nothing works up a sweat like bundling up in your heaviest, most insulated under and outer garments to attack the six inches of new snow in your driveway. I use that verb because after two months of constantly pushing, lifting, and throwing at least three pounds of weight per scoop, a strategy is necessary. It's only the beginning of February, and what was filling the driveway, has become two parallel piles, seven feet high, like a fortress guarding our only way in to the garage.
Before the piles, shoveling wasn't that bad, but now, when I pick up that snow shovel, my mind is saying, "...time to attack the driveway". It's not a pretty picture watching my attempts to throw what I've collected up and over the mountainous sidelines. It doesn't sound good, either. I know grunting doesn't give me more strength but, somehow, there is a certain amount of satisfaction in letting out a guttural "uuuhhh" with each heave-ho.
About an hour later, after trying a different pattern of runways, I consider which plan was best, yesterday's or today's. The amount of pain in my neck and back is my unit of measurement. Sometimes, there isn't any, but when there is, here's a tip for getting rid of the pain: lie down on the snow, and let it be nature's icepack. Do that until your overworked body is cooled down, and then go take a nice hot shower. Don't forget to drink lots of water. See? Just like going to the gym.
All kinds of angles are formed when you're pushing a shovel through snow, so I had to choose this picture called, "Angles of Driftwood".
