Pre-Snowshoe

Already March, I can't help but feel like I missed January and February, like it snuck right past me while I wasn't looking. 

I filled too much of it with have to's instead of want to's, though in fairness, I did get myself into this college thing. I wanted the degree and now am obligated to meet the requirements, three nights a week until ten p.m., plus an on-line class, and this after having a toddler Monday through Friday. I get to sleep about midnight so I can repeat the routine bright and early the next day. Most Saturdays are invested shuttle driving with my old job still, and whatever happens to be free time on nights and weekends is spent completing homework. Sunday morning's at church and lunch afterwards with family and friends, are my week's highlight.

I plan breaks, like a day trip to Disney, or an overnight stay if time allows. I visit parents a couple hours away and sometimes get to enjoy a day here at the house, correcting the disaster that it becomes when no time or effort is made to prevent it.

If I am really lucky I make something, anything, to release some of the pent up creative juices. That is why I signed up for a ceramics class this semester. It does not count toward my degree but it counts toward my sanity!

Life's busyness flows from one thing to the next until they are all simply, past. 

In January I gave my deposit securing my spot for what has become an annual Spring-break ski trip. In February I purchased my lift tickets and paid the balance of the trip fees. Now here at the beginning of March I am on the eve of that departure. Excitement is rising. I look forward to being with six of my kids, four by birth and two by marriage, and with friends old and new. Twenty one of us altogether.

I hope for at least one day of blue skies and sunshine for great photo-ops. My intention is to see, hear, breathe and absorb Winter all the way in, getting my fill until the next time, if there even is one. I, fifty-six year old Patty, am going to purposely bundle up to brace against the much disliked cold, so that I can hurl myself down slippery slopes and fall in icy snow, while not freezing because I am properly outfitted. I will then gather myself up, and repeat! 

I am a little nervous about that, for myself and others. I don't like to get hurt and putting myself in a situation where that is highly more likely, is scary! My thighs will feel the burn, my shins will feel the ache of leaning into the stiff boots, my fingers will numb with cold, and bruises are likely to occur. 
 My crazy competitive boys have hurt themselves on past ski trips which gives me good reason to fear repeats. My girl has gone off the side of the mountain. Bum knees and a broken wrist have happened. 

This time, one daughter-in-love is carrying precious cargo, the next baby G. She will see snow for only the second time in her life, mostly as a spectator this time. I will miss my little baby-cakes and feel bad that my trip will alter what he has become accustomed to. He fills grandma's Monday through Friday with activity, smiles, laughs, discoveries, precious memories old and new, and hugs. Sweet genuine, heart-melting hugs. Of course I'll miss him!

I really am a better me when I break from routine to refresh, and it is with all of me that I hope routine is the only thing that gets broken!

It is only these few days of march, and soon they too will be past, but not without them being planned for, anticipated, filled with living and loving, fully appreciative of what is offered just this once. 

Routine will soon enough demand my attentions again as March finishes and turns to April, then May. Before we know it talk of Summer plans will come, and go. That's just the way it is. It is so important to intentionally make plans not to miss it! One thing for certain, time will go, and how it went is the all important reason we get any of it at all.

It's odd that I can go from brushing sand off of my toes to wool sock fuzz between them in just a matter of a few hours time. These toes are tickled pink for both, and all ten of them and I say,
let Spring-break begin!

P.J.

Leaving for Snowshoe in the a.m.  March 1, 2014

All day long I shuttle guests
here from the land of frosts
in search of warmth and sunshine
they thought might be all but lost

rubbing lotion into skin
too long banned from light
absorbing all they can before
they board their return flight

when once again they'll trade
their cotton white's and pink's and blue's
and have to close their flip flopped feet
back up in socks and shoes

what kind of nut would choose to leave
this tropic paradise?
exchanging it for freezing temps
and piles of snow and ice

well, that would be me, I must confess
I'm prone to nutty stuff
like these few days of winter fun
'til I've had quite enough

then lucky me comes back to where
the weather suits my clothes
to shed my woolen layers
for that warm sand on my toes!

P.J.