On freezing up...
My good friend Joanna sent me a copy of this book after visiting me here early fall.
I read it mid-flight on the the trip to and from southern California - and it kept me connected to this place I now call home.
I thought of it again tonight, because I let the wood fire almost extinguish as I worked. Every time I flounder at my efforts at living and eeking (EEK!) a livelihood in the Adirondacks, I will be saying to myself "Annie could have done it!" or "What would Annie say?". Jeez- I couldn't build a log cabin by myself if my life depended on it...
I don't even like emptying mousetraps.
I'm 53 and long ago decided that the women's lib movement was not all it was cracked up to be. Anne LaBastille (French for "fortress", yes?) begins her book with a chapter entitled "No Home" and says this about the November I am experiencing in my own fashion: "the freeze-up is a prelude to hardship" . . . No wonder I relished the trip to southern California for thanksgiving! I grinned wickedly when I returned to hear that the thermometer had dropped to 6 degrees while I was gone....talk about 6 degrees of separation! I am glad I missed it. That morning I had been on a beach wishing I had brought along my wet suit to join the surfers.
I have been anxious about the approaching winter.
My niece, Jamie (see below) is struggling with leukemia, my business is a challenge. It's the holidays and my nearest family is hundreds of miles away.
What do I do to face the unknown?
Walk. Talk....."balk" and "sulk" have their way with me now and again.
Now I have Anne, who I am told lives quite near here.
Mmmmmmm.
She and I will have words this winter.
