Blog Dis
Winter the oppressor
2025-01-28
In the month of January, the darkness sets into your bones and soul and drags you way down low, and this sinkhole spiral actually begins in November, when the clocks are pushed back, making it darker much earlier. So, by the time we enter January, I begin to look for the telltale marker that there's light at the end of the tunnel. Once it's still light out by 5 pm, there's a sigh of relief and we are renewed with hope, to get through the remaining two months of winter, February and March.
There's much about winter I love. It's quieter because snow acts as a natural blanket to muffle sounds vs summer where all manner of construction wreaks havoc on silence - the pounding, the jack-hammers, the noise of large vehicles backing up with their ever-present beeping to warn those behind them. I love too the cold because I sleep better, as I suspect many do as well. And there's skating the canal, if you live in Ottawa, which is an awesome way to get fresh air and exercise. But by the time I reach March 1st, I want every bloody scrap of snow to be gone, because it's simply just not right for there to be any number of centimeters of the white stuff on the ground! It's just not right, I tell you! Winter is most assuredly the worst oppressor at this time of year. I can see it in the eyes of people in the mornings when they walk to work, or scrape more snow off their windshield - that look of complete despair in having to deal with the routine of coats, boots, gloves, toque and scarf. We all want winter to come to an end, especially the chickadees. We all want the snow to be taken away, to go and not come back, to pave a new patch for clean streets.
The clocks will move ahead by one hour on Sunday, March 9th at 2:00 AM, to mark the beginning of daylight saving time. My father's old remembrance was Spring ahead and Fall behind and it gave me pause to think that if I had the power to spring ahead some aspects of my life, what would top my list? Well, and for starters, I'd spring ahead of my bills, which are not huge by any estimation but nonetheless it would be a grand thing to not have to consider creditors. I do not pay a mortgage or make regular car payments. I have one credit card that is kept under strict control, so it makes my life easier not having to be chased by creditors. My rent is automatically deducted from my bank account, as is payment to my Internet Service Provider, to include my investment deductions into two different banks - for if you're not paying yourself, over and above paying your bills, why then are you breaking your back five days a week? Just to pay bills? You need to get ahead. You need to plan your comfy space in your future life and this requires boatloads of money.
Additionally, I would spring ahead of my publishing plans and have my fan base working full-time in order that I could devote my sensitive sensibilities entirely to the art of creation. I would also spring ahead of any illness, accelerating my recovery so that a cold or flu would be over even before I noticed the symptoms. And I would most assuredly spring ahead of idiotic conversations that morph into arguments because you reach a stage in your life when you immediately recognize an idiot who gaslights for the sake of gaslighting, even if they haven't a clue what they're doing. Nowadays, and with our social networks, there's a good chance that the idiot you're arguing with is just a bot, but I'm often surprised when their arguments are just plunk stupid, without being routed in logic, rather than to engage you in meaningful discourse. Show me a man or a woman who likes to argue, and I'll show you a tumor growth on the side of my head from having to listen to illogic.
There is one useful purpose an argument has and this is to set the stage for awesome make-up sex.
While I think my silly thoughts and keyboard at a furious speed (because I'm blessed with nimble fingers and a typing speed of some 200 words per minute) I know that the Oppressor, I call winter, will eventually leave. Then I'll be mired in the sticky humidity of summer when sweat gathers between the girls and I feel my hips are holding too much moisture like camels' humps and I'll foolishly long again for the cool Fall, to be followed by the glorious arrival of winter and the cold.
I love winter in November and December, and yes even January and February. But March? I truly believe that Julius Caesar was murdered in the month of March because some bastard put a bee in the bonnet of Brutus after surviving a brutal winter campaign battling the frigid cold in another country, soaked in raw blood.
Winter is a beautiful landscape artist.
There's much about winter I love. It's quieter because snow acts as a natural blanket to muffle sounds vs summer where all manner of construction wreaks havoc on silence - the pounding, the jack-hammers, the noise of large vehicles backing up with their ever-present beeping to warn those behind them. I love too the cold because I sleep better, as I suspect many do as well. And there's skating the canal, if you live in Ottawa, which is an awesome way to get fresh air and exercise. But by the time I reach March 1st, I want every bloody scrap of snow to be gone, because it's simply just not right for there to be any number of centimeters of the white stuff on the ground! It's just not right, I tell you! Winter is most assuredly the worst oppressor at this time of year. I can see it in the eyes of people in the mornings when they walk to work, or scrape more snow off their windshield - that look of complete despair in having to deal with the routine of coats, boots, gloves, toque and scarf. We all want winter to come to an end, especially the chickadees. We all want the snow to be taken away, to go and not come back, to pave a new patch for clean streets.
The clocks will move ahead by one hour on Sunday, March 9th at 2:00 AM, to mark the beginning of daylight saving time. My father's old remembrance was Spring ahead and Fall behind and it gave me pause to think that if I had the power to spring ahead some aspects of my life, what would top my list? Well, and for starters, I'd spring ahead of my bills, which are not huge by any estimation but nonetheless it would be a grand thing to not have to consider creditors. I do not pay a mortgage or make regular car payments. I have one credit card that is kept under strict control, so it makes my life easier not having to be chased by creditors. My rent is automatically deducted from my bank account, as is payment to my Internet Service Provider, to include my investment deductions into two different banks - for if you're not paying yourself, over and above paying your bills, why then are you breaking your back five days a week? Just to pay bills? You need to get ahead. You need to plan your comfy space in your future life and this requires boatloads of money.
Additionally, I would spring ahead of my publishing plans and have my fan base working full-time in order that I could devote my sensitive sensibilities entirely to the art of creation. I would also spring ahead of any illness, accelerating my recovery so that a cold or flu would be over even before I noticed the symptoms. And I would most assuredly spring ahead of idiotic conversations that morph into arguments because you reach a stage in your life when you immediately recognize an idiot who gaslights for the sake of gaslighting, even if they haven't a clue what they're doing. Nowadays, and with our social networks, there's a good chance that the idiot you're arguing with is just a bot, but I'm often surprised when their arguments are just plunk stupid, without being routed in logic, rather than to engage you in meaningful discourse. Show me a man or a woman who likes to argue, and I'll show you a tumor growth on the side of my head from having to listen to illogic.
There is one useful purpose an argument has and this is to set the stage for awesome make-up sex.
While I think my silly thoughts and keyboard at a furious speed (because I'm blessed with nimble fingers and a typing speed of some 200 words per minute) I know that the Oppressor, I call winter, will eventually leave. Then I'll be mired in the sticky humidity of summer when sweat gathers between the girls and I feel my hips are holding too much moisture like camels' humps and I'll foolishly long again for the cool Fall, to be followed by the glorious arrival of winter and the cold.
I love winter in November and December, and yes even January and February. But March? I truly believe that Julius Caesar was murdered in the month of March because some bastard put a bee in the bonnet of Brutus after surviving a brutal winter campaign battling the frigid cold in another country, soaked in raw blood.
Winter is a beautiful landscape artist.
