lemons versus blizzards

My friend Ellie has blogged most recently about the lovely lemons growing on her tree in Savannah, Georgia. My trees, in contrast, are bedecked with snow and ice. I just checked the local radar--solid blue.

One of the things I miss most about living in the South, especially in winter, is being able to go outside to smell things. Here, at this moment, it is 24 degrees, windchill of 11, up from 11 degrees, windchill of 8, this morning. It's so cold, in fact, that I'm sitting here in front of my computer, and I have on a jacket. This jacket is the weight I normally wore outside in winter in the South. It is so cold, and I know this from experience, that if I were to go outside, my nose would begin to run, my eyes would tear up and freeze crystals on my eyelashes, and my sense of smell would not exist. It would be lovely to smell Ellie's lemon trees and those big beautiful lemons. It would be lovely to walk outside and enjoy the experience.

Another friend, Mike, lives in San Antonio where the big game is being played tonight. He and I are both Mizzou folk, so I know who he'll root for, but like me, he's probably not going to the game. English people tend not to openly express sports enthusiasms. It somehow makes us seem less erudite and elite to shout over a touchdown. Rather, we are meant to smirk privately over quaint and curious volumes of forgotten lore. Apologies to Poe, who would understand perfectly the mental tug-of-war.

We spoke on the phone earlier with Older Son. He's studying for finals. He's also dealing with a mother-in-law who is determined to drag him and his wife kicking and screaming to heaven with her. She's turned into a real pain for him, and yet when he and his wife first met and married, he was entranced with his mother-in-law. Now he's starting to wish he lived a lot farther away from them than he does.

He spoke of Younger Son feeling depressed (it's a seasonal thing). I do hope that we'll all manage to pull ourselves out of the doldrums in two weeks when we're down there. I'm going to do what I can to make it a good time for everyone, but we may all be faking it.

Our snowstorm is being accompanied by ice and sleet as well as the continuing strong winds, and we are being warned about potential power outages. So I guess I'd probably better start supper, lest we wind up with cold sandwiches eaten in front of the gas fireplace. That's not a bad thing, though. Cuddling together on the sofa in front of the fire is fun. The problem is, Spouse will get all paranoid about the sump pump, and rather than cuddling with me, he'll be down in the basement getting frostbite. We have a new sump pump, with backup, but he won't trust it. He'd rather freeze his tail off and make himself sick than to trust the system to work properly. If he does get sick, maybe Ellie would send us some of those lemons to help him get well. It may be the closest we get to enjoying a Southern-style winter up here in Michigan. Dr. S.