First Days of Winter

The weather station in Paxico is reporting 10 degrees this morning - positively balmy! Driving home last night from Topeka, the car readout indicated 2 below zero at 7:30 pm. When it gets this cold, the water pipes coming from the well into the "basement" of the old garage can freeze. After two instances of enduring that hardship, and paying for expensive repairs, I am vigilant when the temperature gets to zero.

As I was driving home, my mind was full of justifications for NOT taking the trouble to place a small space heater into the basement. I kept telling myself it would "probably" be fine. It was so darned cold outside that I did not want to get out of my warm and toasty car, go into my warm and toasty house, then bundle up in work clothes and trek through the snow over to that freezing and silent empty building. For starters, whangdoodles surely reside there, especially after the sun goes down. There would not be anything truly dangerous, like snakes or giant spiders this time of year, but there could be a mammal, or a group of mammals making themselves at home. A sleepy squirrel or a opossum could savagely attack when I opened the door. Oh, I eventually stopped making excuses and accepted the fact that it had to be done.

It is times like this when I always ask myself, was marriage really THAT bad? It was a job for a husband, no question. As I was trudging through the snow, followed by my faithful dogs, I wondered how a man would genuinely feel about going into the basement on a frigid, dark night. Would he feel any dread at all? Or would it be such a small action preventing such a large headache, that he would simply take it all in stride? Men are expected to be unafraid of spiderwebs or creaking old buildings. They do not mind the snow or the dark, and probably no man on earth believes in whangdoodles. Is it because men truly do not mind, or because they are raised to keep fears and complaints to themselves?

It brought my grandfathers to mind. They always took care of the difficult, dirty, unpleasant things - braving the cold and dark, suffering through many hardships on behalf of their wives and families. It was expected of them. They were responsible. I simply cannot recall either of them complaining about much of anything except the weather and the government. So, I just sucked it up and took care of things last night, and this morning I have running water in my house.