Winter Weight

 One year, when the kids were tiny, we went to Buffalo for Christmas.  There was a bunch of snow and cousins to play with and fun to be had and I believe the kids and I stayed a solid two weeks up there.  It was also bitterly, bitterly cold and every single time we went outside those two weeks, my sweet Texas-born baby William would burst into tears.  Like instantly.  Step outside, face crinkled up, real tears and sobbing within seconds.  I am reminded of this right now as the full weight of winter settles upon me and I, too, want to burst into tears every time I step outside.

Yesterday, it was -26 with the wind chill.  Oh, that's the wind chill, you say.  Okay, true, but until you have had a midwestern winter wind come barreling over the plains and punch you straight on, you may not talk to me of wind chill.  I find that even I am at a loss as to how to best describe that first assault of -26 wind on exposed and unexposed body parts.  Bitter, biting, bracing, polar, vortex, criminal.  Adequate descriptors, I guess. Cutting, slicing, and murderous might be better.  You can wear as many layers as you want; that wind finds a way in.  And settles right into your bones and gives you a weird, instant headache.  I have found it has made me religious once again as all of my curse words are preceded by "Holy".  This morning, snow was added to the wind and when those tiny pellets of murderous, menacing, maniacal moisture hit my face along with that wind, I did not burst into tears, but I did burst out with "What even is this?"

You may be wondering why I am even outside to begin with because surely school is closed when it is that cold.  Some schools did close yesterday, but not mine.  It is the Midwest and people soldier on here.  That put me in a mood beyond grouchy. Despondent, despairing, depressed.  I had forgotten how winter eats away at you and your best intentions to enjoy winter.  Grey skies, subhuman temperatures, salt everywhere.  Omg.  The salt from the roads tracked in every where you go.  Puddles of snow-ice-salt slush at your feet.  Good intentions to eat better blasted away by bone-chilling cold that demands hot things smothered in cheese and meat and carbs.  And not moving from the couch once you get there because you need that heated blanket as you eat your heated carbs.

I am really trying to not let winter beat me, but holy crap, winter is a really worthy contender!  We do try to bundle up and get out when the sun is shining.  We went sledding recently and that was as exhilarating and death-defying as I remembered!  WHOOSSSSSHHHH! You are careening down a frozen hill on a piece of plastic with no real way to stop or steer along with people who stop for no reason mid-hill.  And the long hike back up where your heart is pounding from nearly dying and the steep incline march and your nose is kind of runny and your cheeks hurt from smiling and freezing.  That was a good day.  My person and I also bundled up the other day to hike when it was 9 degrees.  We were like Arctic explorers!  The only people in the park trudging our way to the frozen lake.  I did stand on the frozen lake for a minute which was kind of neat. I was too worried about it cracking because of all the cheese meat carbs; I knew if any part of me went through the ice, I would have to just lie down and die right there.

as brave as I could get.

I do know that one day, it won't be freezing.  Or below freezing.  One day, the sun will come out and actually warm the earth and my bitter soul.  I will have survived a Chicagoland winter and add it like a major award to my accomplishments and achievements.  Until then, I will just try.  I will try to eat a vegetable with my meat carbs.  I will try to find beauty in the stillness of a frozen pond.  I will revel in placing a Buffalo Bills picture in my daily agenda and telling young boys that they are wrong when they claim allegiance to any team other than the Bills.  Other days, I will just give into that bitter biting world outside and be bitter and biting back.  (apologies in advance to those around me).  Yesterday broke me, but today I am trying and tomorrow is Thursday and Thursday is hot yoga and hot yoga is an hour of being warm from head to toe.  And if that doesn't sound amazing to you right now, you have not been punched in the face with a Midwestern winter wind enough.

Baby, It's Cold Inside

 The other day, it was 14 degrees when I left my house.  This is very cold, but it was okay because I was bundled up. I had on a hat and the coat I bought at REI this summer.  (this coat is amazing and I feel warm every time I think about the fact that it retails for $250 and I got it for $20!)  My person and I went to a new park to walk around and we were pretty much the only ones there.  We saw a ton of migrating birds, pelicans included(!), and with our layers and wool socks, only our cheeks were cold.  Sure, 14 degrees is cold, but look at us!  We were in it!  Embracing it!  Loving it!

pink cheeks, big smiles, can't lose

I was feeling pretty confident that winter was going to be just lovely until later that day.  Later, when I couldn't get warm in the house.  Later, when the cold seeped up through those wool sock and my toes said "Brrr!"  Later, when even my nose and fingers were cold. In the house.  It was then that I remembered that winter means always being kind of cold, even in the house.

Wait, you are saying.  Aren't you from Buffalo?  The place that had two feet of snow this weekend alone?  I am, however, let us remember though it has been one million years since I actually lived there.  Dinosaurs had recently stopped roaming the earth, my high school had a terribly racist mascot, and the Bills just had fans, not a mafia behind them.  I've spent the last three decades sweating and this body doesn't seem to know what to do with all this cold except continually say helpful things like "Brrrr!" and "It's cold!"

Also, how did I forget how dry skin gets in the cold?  Oh my God, I am like an iguana, but a saggy iguana whose skin just sort of feels terrible, flakes off, and falls like ashes to the ground.  I brave full-on cold to lotion up after a shower to no avail.  This skin is parched, cracked, and parchment-like.  My nails are brittle.  My hair is limp and doesn't really curl anymore.  I could apply lip balm every three minutes and my lips still feel like they are cracking off.  I am a limp-haired, saggy-iguana-skinned, no-lipped human, and it is only the first of December!

actual photo of me taken this morning.

I texted my brother my cold cries and he told me to bake something, make some, soup, and turn the heat up.  I did one of the three things: I made soup.  When I drink coffee or tea or eat soup, I am not cold!  Those mugs and bowls of beautiful warmth make my fingers and insides warm again.  I didn't bake this time because I was afraid I would try to eat the cold away in cookies.  I also didn't turn up the heat because heat is probably expensive and our apartment is really lacking in heaters.  We have baseboard heaters, one in the living room and one in each bedroom.  This means that out of 24 total walls, only 3 have a heater on it.  I am not great with math but this seems woefully inadequate.

My layers are many, my socks are wool, my cups are filled with warm liquid, and I am still cold.  I mentioned in the lunch room it was sure cold and someone said not to worry, it would warm up come April.  So I stabbed him.  Well, only with my eyes, but still.  My brother also mentioned something about toughening up.  I ignored him because I thought he was rude, but now I get it!! My skin is sloughing off because underneath this Texas-baked exterior is someone who will love the cold!  Someone like my neighbor who went out to the trash the other day Cousin Eddie style: robe, no shirt, or pants, and wearing slippers.  I saw this from where I was curled on the couch, under a blanket, with a hot coffee in both hands, saying helpfully to my person that "BRRR. It's cold." Yes!  This is it!  When the last iguana layer peels off, I will be reborn into a shiny, smooth, hydrated, winter goddess!  

This is great!  This will help me see past the fact that the sun begins to set at 4:30pm. I am going to be a winter goddess!  I am going to love the cold and the wind and wind chills and snow boots!  I will delight in the gray skies and bare trees and dead grass.  I will radiate happiness to my fingers and toes and that happiness will feel like warmth.  This is perfect!!

I feel so much better.  I was worried that I was wimping out very early into winter but now I see the process.  Slough, shiver, repeat.  And, if I know anything from watching every season of Alone, it is that shivering burns calories, so I am going to go ahead and bake those cookies after all!