As I sadly drag myself out of the warmth and peace of my bed, little flashes of light spew out of my blanket. I can see the static electricity because it is still dark. My dry static hair reminds me of seaweed when I bring a brush to it. All the little follicles want to grab on to my brush but not to each other after it's pulled through. The bathroom floor is cold and clammy. The skillet on the stove was warm and crackly. (How about that? I cooked).
Dusting off my car this morning was fluffy and wonderful. I actually take too long to do it, because I am mostly playing. Crisp, red-faced memories of childhood flood me. Huddling around the radio for school closing information. The dryer crammed with soggy mittens. Finding the dog in a snow bank. Remembering my dad telling me that this kind of snow is no good for snowmen.
I warmed up a bit with a white-knuckled tip-toed rear-wheeled drive into work. Warmed up a lot more after a quick workout at the gym. I wear my big warm black boots, and cranked the space heater under my desk. I watched the trees outside my window with their white burdens blowing off of them. Their post-war frozen arms and legs are victoriously strewn about the street. I don't always drink cocoa, but I did today.
I don't wanna miss it, this life.
Ate some crow over the weekend and it didn't taste too bad. New Lindsey IS a stud, but not so much at Volleyball anymore, and maybe not as much at speaking in front of peeps as she would hope. But it's no big deal.
And less vaguely… I read a book this past weekend that agreed with my take on Balance. That it's a dumb Christian-ese word that is nowhere to be seen in the Bible. Paul was not a 'Balanced' guy. He didn't divide his life into a prioritized pie-chart that said: 25% in-chains gospel preaching. 25% receiving beatings, 25% feeding the poor, ….etc. he was at the beck and call of Jesus. He just was. He was salt when he was asked to be -- mundane, common, not the main course, sparse. He was light when he was asked to be. Visible, profound, definitive, big, pushing dark away and drawing life to it. It was nice to hear someone else write it. That I'm not nuts for thinking Balance is a silly thing. That sometimes when I work late and get no sleep, and sometimes I sleep late and miss work. It's, of course not quite that simplistic, but the idea is one that I have been trying to defeat. That somehow, if you hold your body just right, if you constrain just right, you somehow won't fall off this tightrope and crash into the leering jeering onlookers below.
This weekend I am off to kick start the ski season. Not to mention a slew of short trips to mop up the rest of my frequent flyer miles. It will pale in comparison to last year, but only if I let it. I'm pretty sure mountains are all still awesome. I'm pretty sure my feet will hurt the same whether I've been skiing the Alps or the Rockies…and I'm pretty sure I'll laugh just as hard since Tami and company will be there to re-hash last year's ski-stories. I'm pretty sure that I WON'T be eating Diet Coke and Cookies for breakfast.
I pray you are warm. Or thinking warm thoughts.
(How about that? I pray. )
