…Don’t get me wrong, I love a blizzard. EVERYTHING ABOUT A BLIZZARD, from the early rumblings of “something to keep an eye on” on the weather sites, to the empty aisles in the grocery stores…who needs milk and bread, we hit the chocolate and cheese sections, to making sure there is a shovel of some kind just outside each door, firewood on the back porch, emergency candles, rubber ducks floating in the water-filled bathtub…
then the countdown as NOAA tweaks and teases the snow totals out of the more reliable European model…like that.
Anticipation builds and nothing beats those few extra flakes that trump the forecasted foot or two. Yes, I love a blizzard.
But the last time we got one of those was when Finnegan was a little pup. And the winters in between have been dismally short on temps cold enough to produce the white stuff.
But……this winter is shaping up and laying down…in short controlled bursts… and I have been simply reeking of positivity lately, so I am happily learning to also LOVE these back to back to back little snowfalls.
Turns out 2-6 inches of snow offer almost all of the same gifts of beauty and soul warming wooly slippered comfort…without the sore shoveling muscles from moving those big mountains and drifts… and the cabin fever that hovers over Herself when she can’t get out of the lane.
The hearty Bernese Mt. Dog Finnegan has had weekly doses of heaven and has begun to take for granted that her first few steps each morning will be giant leaps into deliciously soft cold snow. I have rarely seen her this happy.
Herself has made several batches of her favorite snowstorm apple bake and now has the recipe…down Pat.
Sue and Zola helped to re-stock the firewood and the log cabin has been a toasty refuge for this tired artiste at the end of long luxurious days at the easel.
And, indeed, those long, glorious days at the easel have been pure bliss.
I was going to wax on about how the muses tend to find artists when the winter dampens the bridge to the outside world. How, in this world of bells and whistles which emanate from our pockets and conspire to shatter those hard fought for slivers of emptiness, we struggle to find mental rest stops.
And how magical it is,
that when just a couple inches of snow falls,
in the studio yard,
being forced to sit in stillness,
reshuffles the creative deck.
There ya go,
now I’m headed back to work.
Stay frosty out there…