Extra Days...

Waxing thoughtful tonight...

We are again in the grasp of a polar vortex. Freakishly cold air has come down from the north pole and is resting over Kentucky, well, actually all over the middle and eastern states. We made it into the teens today. For most of the morning we were at 3 degrees in Sadieville. There is snow on the ground. And the forecast is for more snow tonight and through the day on Saturday with accumulations of 3-6 inches at my last look at the weather. Next week we will again have days in the single digits.

Now, if one lived in northern Michigan or Minnesota or even Wisconsin, this type of winter temperatures might seem normal. You would also anticipate a deep snowfall to contend with throughout the winter. When we took our trip with Nissa and Todd to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, Todd took us out to the very northern tip of Michigan. The little community was Copper Harbor. As we drove out to this piece of land in the UP there was a pull off with an enormous thermometer like sign. It had the snowfall depths for past years. This thing was several stories high. These people have lots of snow that they deal with, definitely not like our little bit of snow here.

The deal is, this is not that far north and it is not the normal weather pattern for Kentucky. We deal differently here than they would up there and that is okay.

Our kids have been out of school for 11 days. It should be noted they just had two weeks off for their Christmas break. Now, after starting back, they have now missed 11 days. That is two weeks plus one day.

If the currentweather pattern holds and we get the forcasted snow and it can't melt, we are looking at another week without school. They close for the entire county when they close. There are a lot of tiny winding rural roads in our county. When they are covered with snow and ice they are not a place for a school bus full of children to be driving. Add to that the kids standing out in sub-zero wind chills (if not temperature) and the potential for frostbite, it just makes common sense to not hold school. The national news did a bit the other night from a northeastern city about the bitter cold and the frostbite problems being more than they have ever experienced. They said it only take 15 minutes to have the frostbite begin.

It is interesting to watch Facebook and see how young families are coping. Kids are really ready to go back to school. Parents are wanting them to be able to back to school. But in the face of all that, they are finding interesting ways to fill time in a positive fashion. At first there was actual snow in the yard to play in. That is novel. Our Andie was out blowing bubbles in the freezing air and watching them shatter. She had the kids fill colored ballons with water and watch them freeze so they had jewels in the yard. One mother filled tubs with snow for each of her little ones and pulled out the dinosaurs to play with in that snow instead of going out in the cold. The library is trying to stay open, the movie theater is trying to have extra hours when they can stay open, one mother posted a link to kid's activities for this cold weather in Lexington, all in an effort to give the kids an outlet for all that pent up energy.

In Lexington the news tells us they have places for the homeless to get out of these temperatures. One little cafe is serving free soup to those in need.

How does this affect two retired people in the country? We find ourselves with extra days or extra hours that we didn't expect. Appointments have been moved because roads were not clear. My visiting teaching for January is going to be awful. I have moved several of these visits, including the one for this morning, several times. When that happens, we end up with hours or a day at home that we didn't anticipate. And that has been a good thing.

I have been able to finish three books during this last week in preparation for an upcoming trip. What a treat!! Tonight I am going to start another baby afghan. Even having productive things with which to fill our time, we still get a little stir crazy. Today Claude and I drove into Georgetown and did a few errands, got milk for Papa and for us, and then took Papa to lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant. We all commented how great the food was. It was just because it was so nice to be out again.

I am grateful we have been able to get Papa out twice this week between yucky weather. That feels very good. And, I am grateful we have enough on had at Papa's and at our home so, if we are totally shut in, we can do just fine. Monday, we didn't have bread. Not a problem. I had frozen loafs of bread dough in the fridge. We just let two thaw and rise and baked them up to go with some delicious chicken soup Claude made. It felt good to be prepared.

So I will take my 'extra days or hours' as they come. I will revel in the ability to accomplish things at a nice pace without filling I have to rush to accomplish 15,000,000 things in a day. I shall be grateful for being prepared and for having safe journey when we do get out. And I shall enjoy the view of our snow covered hill with the little herd of deer out there trying diligently to get a few blades of grass. It is a little miracle.