It's not even *technically* one week into "winter" and I gotta say....I MISS PRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!! Dear Sun, where have you gone?!?!? Therapeutic ocean salt, come back to me!!! Coco water and rum: I NEED YOU!
This summer I had all these fantasies about a nice cozy winter, such as: I would make things in a crock pot! I would cozy up on the couch with mulled wine and a book! I would take a bath at night with candles and another glass of mulled wine! I would wake up early to snowshoe the virgin trails after a night of snowfall!
However, after dealing with the first real heavy snow of the season, I'm ready for my vodka spritzers and gazpacho again. I mean, can I
really do this??? All this snow? All this cold? All this TOTAL LACK of sun? All this living
not in the
middle of nowhere, but at the
very end of nowhere??
I'm trying to think of the positives, one being that the gym at school has a sauna in the locker room. I'm a pretty big fan of the saunas and steam rooms. Two: the "Wellness Center" at school also offers Vitamin D lamps that you can make an appointment to sit under. Yeah, the lack of sun is kinda a big bummer for me. Also, the fact that the sun doesn't rise until 8:30 AM (and it is JUST rising at that hour) is a bit of a downer, and it's not *really* light out until 9 or 9:30AM.
De-press-ing!!! Waking up at 7AM in PR was so easy because it was already BRIGHT light out by then. PR and the UP are incomparable, obviously. And I hate to be a person who doesn't appreciate what is here and now, but seriously. SUN. I need ya, homie. Come out and play, even if snow is still on the ground.
The scary thing is, even though we have had snow in the UP for at least a month now, we haven't had THAT much of it according to U.P. legend. The Legends of the U.P. Winter I was told before coming here were of Homer-esque proportions. My retired neighbor claims she can
usually only see my
second story window this time of year because the snow has piled up against the rest of the house. And her husband claims that the only time they can even see
that much of my house when they make their way "through the goddamn snow tunnel" that has built up along side the road. There are pictures in bars around here that show evidence of hard Winter's past, where the roads
really do look like snow tunnels, which makes me think my neighbors aren't totally full of it and which also make me really nervous for what lies ahead. The next 5 years will truly be an Odyssey...!
