January 27, 2006

• There ain’t nuthin’ like the real thing.

  I’ve gotten some well-meaning advice about my seasonal affective
  disorder and my family dilemma.  Now I am going to ungraciously
  demonstrate why most people stop trying to give me advice after a while.

  dingus6
  suggested that there’s someone who might be willing to “help” with
  chores in exchange for a “place to stay.”  I have fantasized at
  times about having some star-crossed soul (a non-smoker who doesn’t use
  alcohol or other drugs) wander up to my door and offer to exchange
  his/her carpentry and mechanical skills for a pallet on the floor of my
  squalid digs.  It hasn’t happened yet, and I can’t see myself
  being willing to take in someone whose lifestyle would aggravate my
  allergies or otherwise endanger my well-being, or whose practical
  skills don’t exceed my own.  I’m not up to running a rescue mission.

  When I talk at 12-step meetings in town about my lifestyle, the general consensus is that my ability to not only stay here in these conditions, but actually be happy
  here most of the time, is totally incomprehensible.  Nobody I know
  would volunteer even to share this crappy little falling-apart trailer
  that the owner GAVE to me free of charge just to get out of paying the
  taxes on it, much less to chop wood and carry water for the dubious
  privilege.

  These woods are dotted with a scattering of abandoned cabins and
  trailers whose former inhabitants have fled back to the warmth of the
  south and/or the lights of the city.  Anyone enamored enough of
  these woods to want to live here would be able to squat in one of those
  places without having to put up with a crazy old woman who talks to
  spirits and won’t tolerate smokers.  Anyone wanting more comfort
  than is usually found in those abandoned places can find winter
  quarters housesitting for some of the many people who only use their
  cabins in the summer, and whose cabins have amenities lacking here.  The exceptions might be people with
  large families, dog teams, obvious psychoses, or other impediments that
  would tend to make them unwelcome in my house, too.

  wixer said,
  “Maybe one or two of those light bulbs that give you ‘sun’ might
  help?”  Maybe so.  I have a few of those lights, packed
  away.  I think it best that I leave them packed away.  They
  use horrendous amounts of wattage, and I would be much less inclined to
  regularly switch on a light and gaze at it than I am to suit up and go
  out into the snowy sunshine.  I would be far more likely to want
  to plant marijuana under those lights, not because I want to smoke any
  of it, but because of the temptation of the potential income.  I
  just don’t want to go there.

  
  While Greyfox was here today, clouds were moving in but the sun was
  shining through occasionally, so I got out into it.  The “wattage”
  of that light, especially reflected off the snow, far exceeds the
  expensive indoor kind.  It has the added advantage of being
  accompanied by exhilarating fresh air and (sometimes) breathtakingly
  beautiful vistas or wildlife sightings.  Truly, there ain’t
  nuthin’ like the real thing.

  My
  foxy windstorm has blown through and is gone on back down the valley to
  his own squalid little digs on the edge of town.  On his way up,
  he stopped in Willow and picked up the library book I had
  requested.  Now I can see if any of the author’s suggestions for
  avoiding winter blues will work for me.  The first event of the
  Winter Carnival is a sled dog race that starts this evening. 
  Greyfox said that the parking lot at the community center (where the
  library is) was full of mushers hitching up their teams.  As he
  had guessed, I was sorry to have missed that.

   
  After our shared lunch, while I was outdoors soaking up rays,
  Greyfox was in here using our computer.  Koji is always so glad to
  see the missing pack member that he often makes a nuisance of himself
  just by trying to get close.  Here, he had been yelled at and sent
  away after trying to lay his head in Greyfox’s lap.  He went
  around and crawled onto the back of the sofa (AKA “Couch Potato
  Heaven”) where he could be between the two of us, which is his very
  favorite place in the whole world.

  The temperature has been rising slowly all day.  It is up to five
  below zero now — still not truly “warm” but so much less chilling than
  when it was thirty degrees colder.  I have been feeding wood into
  the stove less often, piling it less deeply in there, attempting to let
  some of the accumulated charcoal burn to ash and reduce the depth of
  the bed of coals that built up this week while we tried to keep the
  house warm enough to keep my tropical plants alive.

  If it keeps warming up, it will surely snow.  So far, the snow
  pack along the road out to the cul de sac has been windblown and packed
  enough that it’s only about knee deep and I managed to slog through it
  today.  To me, this is a lot better than when the snow is so deep
  I’m confined to the plowed roads and shoveled paths.  I have
  already had to abandon my little path through the trees to the muskeg
  because that’s where the snow drifted that blew off the road.
  

  • 7:39 pm
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