Fortifications

The snow has come again.

We were warned, everyone of us. Fourteen to eighteen inches of the “white stuff”.

That honks me off. I assume people smart enough to discuss the weather on the air know it’s called “snow” and we can take it. We live in New England - some of us by choice - we can handle it.

Don’t call it “white stuff”.  Please.  Don't.

Still, schools were cancelled the night before, manic shopping was taking place in grocery stores.

So it was a perverse pleasure to wake up and see no curtains of flakes masking the houses of Doctor’s Row. In fact, no snow fell until well after 8 a.m.

Then the roof fell.

I took the bus to the Orchard. I’d rather have a big tires under me .

The Mall was deserted for most of the day. Our rule of thumb is that any people crazy enough to show up in circumstances like this are crazy enough to want to buy something.

It makes for very entertaining interaction with people who are both interested and interesting.

More so than the average visitor - and our average is pretty entertaining as well.

With folks on later shifts stranded at home I was asked to stick around, which I did. The bus ride home was quite direct - the snow had given way to sleet, pattering against its big windows like handfuls of BB’s thrown by angry Seventh graders. The bus would slip on hilly corners.

With meetings and baby sitting cancelled I found my way into Geno’s Bar, the jive dive classic rock bar across Bosnia from my front door.

There I found owner J.R. and Mike the bouncer engaged in a fierce game of Scrabble on the bar top - to the sound Tom Waits singing “The Eyeball Kid”.

It seemed like the perfect way to end such a day. A snifter of brandy - a little smoother than my usual single-malt and just as prohibitively expensive - to celebrate overcoming the demands of the weather and work.

The beauty of it all was having a warm, productive place to come home to. The fairy lights on Chief Soctoma were visible from the back door steps of Geno’s, calling out to me - and making navigation after a solid brandy much more secure.

With the new computer and software writing music has become much easier - I’ve written a new tango in just one day, from concept to posting. Perhaps I am slowly starving - well, it seems it, comparing last year’s paychecks to this year’s - but my soul seems to be well fed and there is room to “see” - really see - the connections around me.

I don’t know where it will lead. Today it led through intense weather and people.

Tomorrow? I can’t wait.