today it's finally snowing, and it's so lovely that unless i position myself in front of a window, i'll probably have whiplash by 2 pm--the patio doors are to my right and i keep looking over to ensure that yes, it is still snowing.
henry is watching things for me while i type; he's positioned in front of the doors, about a foot back, watching the snow fall, and people bundled in layers fumble through the wind to their cars.
i think this fall i have been sick more than i have any other year. it's been awful--random fevers, a cold that doesn't ever just get nasty but dabbles along in annoyance, and yesterday, the stomach flu, courtesy my beloved spousal equivalent. this last one happened so rapidly that i thought he had food poisoning, but then six hours later i was sick, too.
today i feel fine, but have that tender-tummy feeling that'll take a bit to go away.
anyway i was bummed about being sick for two reasons. the first was that i was supposed to do training on friday at work, and was actually very excited to do so. the second was that dan had made reservations tonight at a nice place, at which we would get to dress up a bit and go eat fancy food.
this morning we discussed it before he went to work and made the decision to cancel. i doubt either of us would have enjoyed the meal simply because in my mind at least, i'd be overly concerned about eating a ton of rich food when for the last 24 hours i've been subsisting on apple cider and peanut butter toast.
so the dressy night out will be postponed. but i suppose in the end, that just will allow me to spend more time enjoying the weather.
when i say that, i mean it honestly. i love living in minnesota, for the simple fact that it snows. in the summer, when all ten thousand lakes have moved from lake form to humidity, and you sweat just considering the movement of your eye lids, i could live elsewhere. but in the winter i'd live no where else.
(except perhaps new england, which seems to have gotten a ton of snow in the last few years...)
***
the sunday morning before thanksgiving i came downstairs to see that i'd missed a call from my dad, so i called back. mom answered; they were out having breakfast and had run into someone that looked familiar.
mom: hello dear.
me: hey mom, i saw dad called, what's up?
mom: well...we're at the ihop here in town and we ran into someone you used to live with.
me: what?
mom: someone you used to live with, in bemidji.
me: like a roommate?
mom: yes, that minister's daughter. i can't remember her name so we had to call.
me (hesitating): oh, you mean serena?
mom: yes! that's it!
me: yeah, we don't talk anymore.
mom: that's what i thought.
me: did she talk to you?
mom: no, she looked at us and i could see that she knew us, but she didn't say anything. so i went up to her.
me: (dead silence) what did she say?
mom: she's here visiting her brother and sister-in-law. they're having a baby. so you don't talk to her anymore?
me: well, honestly, she decided not to talk to us anymore.
mom: oh, well, i just couldn't remember her name. she's put on some weight, though...
(which is mom for: she's fat. but mom's too minnesotan and polite to just blurt that out.)
it was kind of surreal. i guess after that year happened and since then, i've tried to excise her from my life--which really didn't work at all. then i tried another tactic--accepting that she was in my life, and that now she is not in my life any more. which worked much better. since i've started thinking in that manner, i'm not such a nervous nelly when someone brings up her name. but that morning was still a reminder for me that i've got a ways to go.
dan and i discussed it later; he was surprised that mom would say anything but i wasn't. she wouldn't be my mother if she hadn't.
***
thanksgiving, by the by, was nice. it's always good to see dan's parents, and they're such a hoot to be around. they remind me so much of my mom's extended family that i always think that his uncle louie could be another member of her family.
which would be gross, considering my relationship with dan, but i think it just comes from living in northern mn for your whole life and never leaving. i'm sure that if my mom's entire family was french i'd feel the same way if i went to france, or something along those lines.
anyway it was good to see his family and their myriad animals, and it was just as good to get home, scrape and wash the smoke-smell from ourselves and our clothing, and see our own two fuzzy beasts, who chastised us with their big kitty eyes for having abandoned them for days at a time.
***
which brings me back to today, saturday. usually a day during which i'd have cleaned the whole house by now--just to get it done and out of the way. however i cleaned the kitchen, rested, rearranged the foyer, rested, blogged...and now it is time to get up again, and perhaps take a chance at rescuing my carpeting from cat hair.
which in itself is a pipe dream. (;
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