White-Out

Just a little new snow this morning, storm delayed. Get to the museum, open up, get the mail; bills for the month in the mail, final child-support payment. Go to the UPS store, to check on boxes for the diaramas, and on the way back it starts to snow. I don't even think about it, stop at Kroger (never walk up the hill without carrying something) for some canned chilies, some rice, some southern-style frozen biscuits Mom turned me on to. She says they're ok, which is high praise from a world-class biscuit maker. When I get to the bottom of the driveway it's snowing hard, the walk up magical, still a bit of sunlight bleeding through and there's a mica-like quality to some of the flakes. I stop, mid-slog, and hold out my insulated black-gloved hand. The frozen stuff is actually in several forms, lovely flakes, some tiny frozen balls, some flat stuff, in between. It's the balls that are acting like mica. Unload, store things away, then suit-up and go cut a few sticks, split a thin twisted round of Red Maple. Snowing harder, I finally get too uncomfortable and go inside. Colder temps coming, so I let the stove burn down, before stoking again, divert the smoke directly out the stovepipe. A good cookstove allows a setting, with its two dampers, that allows the cook to clean the smoke-chase and only get slightly smoked himself. I dump the ashes, and clean the chase, all into a two gallon galvanized pail, with a bent bail, that is perfect for this job, because its height wedges under the skirt of the stove and minimizes mess. Talk about a mess, the house is a disaster. In a fine way. Clearly, someone lives here. And judging from the neatly folded piles, he wears several different outfits. And I'd say, from a look outside, that he'll need them all in the next few days. Not exactly a blizzard. I can't keep the floor clean, I'm in and out too often, tracking wood-chips and frozen leaves. The frozen world. I have to take a last walk, before I change clothes and cook three crab cakes, while I'm still well-suited. And it's beautiful, and so dry, the snow just brushes off. It's black and white and gray, the world, it's not either-or. I ate, I shaved. I think I need a nap. This life is exhausting, I stopped at CVS and bought a wind-up alarm clock. I have to keep the home-fires going. I hate the ticking of a clock, so I'll sleep on the sofa, and put the clock upstairs, I just need the alarm, to stoke the stove. One stick every two hours will keep the house warm enough and doesn't require adjusting dampers. I'll need to dump some hot ashes, but I have a system for that.