ice

Have I ever really complained here about the weather? What? I have? Oh fine: at the edges. About the absence of snow. About an absence of rain for my gardens. About a frost that comes in mid May and kills off fruit flowers and delicate annuals. About a tornado that swept through here and made a mess of the farmette lands just a handful of days before my daughter's wedding was to take place here. But for the most part I do accept what comes our way. In the winter it's cold and in the summer it's hot and in between we get a little bit of everything.

But today -- oh my. I do not have anything good to say about our weather. Indeed, I dislike every aspect of it intensely. 

It's cold. Fine. No problem. It's February. It's going to be cold. (We will reach a high of 22F, or -6C.) It's windy. Fine. I understand. With the cold comes the wind sometimes. But it's the third point that puts this into the category of awful: we have a morning-long ice storm. All the schools are closed for the day as well they should be. Most roads are impassable. Everything is crusted over with a layer of ice and the stuff just keeps on falling. 

An ice storm is never safe, but it can be pretty. Trees with a shimmering clear layer of ice can look rather enchanting (even though ice can damage the limbs and knock down healthy growth). But this ice storm doesn't even have visual appeal. The ice pellets fall to the ground and make it impossible to move around outside with any degree of safety.

The day's schedule is a mess. Parents need help with childcare, but I don't feel confident in being out on the roads. Their dad, who has actually taken special courses on how to race a car on ice, drives them over and I cross my fingers that 1. we wont lose electricity and 2. that I will be able to drive them back home. This mess is supposed to end. At some point.

(Can I give you some eye candy amidst all these weather complaints? How about this bunch of tulips at our breakfast table?)

Even before the two older kids come, I have a Zoom call with my Polish friends. When we planned for this call, I had thought we'd be entering a period of calm and stability. And we are, in terms of Covid, in a period of relative calm. But of course there is now suddenly (except really not so suddenly at all! just ask any Pole) the problem of the Ukraine.

There is nothing good to be said about this crisis. As one of my Zoom friends said -- the joke goes that no one knows what's in Putin's head, including Putin himself.

 

Okay, let's go back to the reliably sweet topic of grandkids. Today, it's all about these guys:

When I move so quickly from one set of kids (in Chicago!)  to the next (in Madison), I am always astonished how there can be so many different variations on a good theme. As I've said before, all my grandkids are wonderful, at the same time that they are wonderful in different ways.

 

(there's a story in that girl's head)

(she tells him - Sparrow, make your sweet guy face; he does it)

(pretending to be a cat)

(man on the go)

(loves books... in his own way!)

And outside, the ice grips our corner of south central Wisconsin and the air feels so very cold -- a high of 22F -- and you just have to shrug it off -- what can you expect, it's February. (As my grandgirl will say -- the day of the many twos on Tuesday!)

I hope you had a good 2 22 22. And that you found reason to smile at the ridiculousness of it all.

With love.