Brittle

Everything seems a little brittle in the cold. The forecast calls for a low of -2 tomorrow and nothing above 30 degrees all week. We had about six inches of snow on Thursday, but it has compacted down in the cold. There are cold weather chores. We have to scrape ice from the windshield, and I carry Charlie out to the barn at least a couple of times a day. He’ll race back to the house on his own small, freezing feet, but he won’t go out without a lift. Getting dressed is different, not just the layers, but also the way I do and don’t think about clothes. These are not days for thinking about what I look like, but only about how warm I will be.

The big chore is snow removal. We bought a couple of heated mats for the front patio so that we have a little patch that stays clear for Charlie’s early morning pee. It also has the advantage of making the last few feet of approach to the house ice free for company (or for us returning with packages). But other than those few feet, it’s shoveling or plowing.

Jay is a wonder on his beautiful Kabota tractor. The long driveway is perfectly clear, as are the parking area and the path to the barn and the access to the mailbox down on Gulf. He says that moving snow is not much different from moving earth, except that snow is lighter. With the heated cab, it doesn’t look horrible to be out there, and he seems to enjoy both the doing and the having it done. The back stairs and the path across the back patio have to be shoveled, but I found that I enjoyed doing it. I cleared a minimal path, just a shovel wide, the first day after the snow, but the wind that night pretty well filled in my work. Jay did a wider, superior path the next day.

I know I’ve written about the beauty of the winter landscape before, and I don’t have much new to say. But one morning, even though it was well below freezing, the sun had melted droplets at the end of every tree branch, and each branch glistened in the light. The car was not yet toasty and my hands and feet were cold, but the beauty of the ride into town made up for any discomfort the cold brought. The snow that’s fallen is wet and sticky, so each branch of tree and bush holds a line of it. The pines hold great patches of snow, and all the trees bow with the weight.

Life is quiet here, although Hazel has bursts of manic playfulness after meals. She launches herself from floor to couch to chair to hassock. She enlists Charlie in house-wide games of tag. She charges up her scratching post and madly chases the laser pointer around in circles. And then she falls asleep. She has a fondness for paper, and has made a pretty good dent in the edges of the latest Consumer’s Report. After several mornings of finding Splenda packets scattered on the floor I started remembering to put the Splenda bowl on the counter at night. Interestingly, she required very little by way of training to keep off the kitchen counters, but the table has proved to be more of a lure and does not yet qualify as off limits in her little brain. She’s lovely, and growing daily.

Jay and I started an introduction to ceramics class this past Monday at a wonderful venue called the Smithy. Jay had considerable success in making his first cylinders on the wheel, but I had spectacular collapses. I had enough brief glimpses of success to feel confident that I’ll get it, and even if I don’t make anything worth firing in this eight week course, I know I’ll enjoy it. It’s good for the soul to try something that requires totally new skills. The gallery building of the Smithy complex is the oldest building in Cooperstown, built as a blacksmith shop in 1786 by the founding Cooper, father of the writer. It’s a beautiful stone building, and you can still see the great bellows and forge. The classes are held in a much newer building out back. Like so many things, it’s a little Cooperstown miracle that such a community resource can thrive in such a little town. We’ve been to a couple of openings at the gallery, and a Palo Alto gallery would be pleased to draw such crowds.

Openings at the Smithy are for the warmer months that are hard to remember during the winter. Town is quiet. The Farmers’ Market is alive, but minimal. The snow is crunchy underfoot. But it was warm and cheery at Mel’s, and the meatloaf club sandwich was delicious and not at all brittle.