November
2nd, 2014
“Winter will be coming”.
It certainly wasn’t cold today - mid-forties - but cooler than it’s been in quite a while; and with Descent Into The Darkness Day upon us, dark earlier than we’ve been used to. It was good to stop into the warm pub, on the way home from not running a marathon. (I did, as the train crossed the bridge into Manhattan this morning, catch a glimpse of industrious, if misguided, runners). But on the way home, well-guided if not industrious, I wanted warmth and something to eat.
The regular waitress was busy with a special party, but slowed enough as she passed my table to say “winter will be coming”.
We’re not even halfway through the fall, but the idea of winter coming has been planted. Most years, there’s a day in late August when a faded look to the trees, or a sudden breeze, or a passing cloud across the sun, makes me think “fall is coming”.
And today was the fall day when early darkness and unusual chill, and a passing comment made me think of winter.
It used to be a joke between my mother and me that “it’s time to get in the winter provisions”. There was a theory that I would get a good supply of heavy and bulky items well before the bad weather set in, so that when it was snowy or icy I wouldn’t have to venture out; or at worst would have to carry only light perishables through the deep drifts and howling wind.
It was a fine theory.
Every year, when the first heavy snow hit, I’d look at my empty pantry, and call my mother to say “I’m going to hitch Oliver to the sleigh and set out to the village. I’ll get your provisions too.” (Oliver Twist was my cat. He was an orphan, and when I fed him he asked for more).
More often than not, my mother would have had not only the forethought, but the ambition, to have gotten extra groceries; and her apartment being closer than the village, I’d wind up getting a meal there.
In the midst of the Y2K hysteria, we were advised to prepare “as if for a major storm”. I pictured myself on the first dawn of the new millennium struggling through deep snow, prepared as usual.
There was another joke between us. After visiting my brother and sister-in-law, either on or soon after Thanksgiving, in the northern wilderness of Fort Montgomery, we would say that the mountain pass would soon be closed by blizzards, and we wouldn’t see them till the new year. I don’t recall ever missing a visit there, either on or soon after Christmas.
“Winter will be coming”.
It certainly wasn’t cold today - mid-forties - but cooler than it’s been in quite a while; and with Descent Into The Darkness Day upon us, dark earlier than we’ve been used to. It was good to stop into the warm pub, on the way home from not running a marathon. (I did, as the train crossed the bridge into Manhattan this morning, catch a glimpse of industrious, if misguided, runners). But on the way home, well-guided if not industrious, I wanted warmth and something to eat.
The regular waitress was busy with a special party, but slowed enough as she passed my table to say “winter will be coming”.
We’re not even halfway through the fall, but the idea of winter coming has been planted. Most years, there’s a day in late August when a faded look to the trees, or a sudden breeze, or a passing cloud across the sun, makes me think “fall is coming”.
And today was the fall day when early darkness and unusual chill, and a passing comment made me think of winter.
It used to be a joke between my mother and me that “it’s time to get in the winter provisions”. There was a theory that I would get a good supply of heavy and bulky items well before the bad weather set in, so that when it was snowy or icy I wouldn’t have to venture out; or at worst would have to carry only light perishables through the deep drifts and howling wind.
It was a fine theory.
Every year, when the first heavy snow hit, I’d look at my empty pantry, and call my mother to say “I’m going to hitch Oliver to the sleigh and set out to the village. I’ll get your provisions too.” (Oliver Twist was my cat. He was an orphan, and when I fed him he asked for more).
More often than not, my mother would have had not only the forethought, but the ambition, to have gotten extra groceries; and her apartment being closer than the village, I’d wind up getting a meal there.
In the midst of the Y2K hysteria, we were advised to prepare “as if for a major storm”. I pictured myself on the first dawn of the new millennium struggling through deep snow, prepared as usual.
There was another joke between us. After visiting my brother and sister-in-law, either on or soon after Thanksgiving, in the northern wilderness of Fort Montgomery, we would say that the mountain pass would soon be closed by blizzards, and we wouldn’t see them till the new year. I don’t recall ever missing a visit there, either on or soon after Christmas.
Coming out of the warm pub, I thought of holidays past; and
winters past, and winters to come. And I thought of stopping in the supermarket
as I passed, to begin laying in supplies.
But I have plenty of time.
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