Now I’m trying to remember my two weeks off at Christmas. And yes, it was Christmas I celebrated, not the winter solstice or New Year’s… well, I sort of celebrated New Year’s. I watched the Ball drop in Times Square, from the Midwest, at home, in front of the fireplace. Can’t imagine why I would enjoy standing around in the cold in Times Square on New Year’s Eve. It’s odd to see the ball drop on TV  in Madison, Wisconsin when the new year is still an hour away. I’m not used to that, even after living here for 5+ years. The vacation cycle of anticipation, excited implementation, followed by the blues has repeated itself predictably yet again. I’ve been back at work for 2 weeks, have just started my 3rd week back, and I’m totally inundated by all the little pieces of annoyances that go into my job. I’ve almost totally forgotten about how nice it was to be off, surrounded by adult children, relatives I don’t see too often, lots of holiday food, snowfall… it’s all a blur. There are the photos to remind me, but the sleeping in, the casual cups of coffee, playing cards, looking at twinkling lights… Gone for yet another year. It’s that Disney Circle of Life that repeats itself so predictably. You’d think after half a century, I’d be used to it. I always see it coming and then… I can’t seem to shake it until a few more weeks go by. And all the while, I enjoy winter, but week after week of biting cold… it might be getting to me!

Ah, the weather in Wisconsin! My favorite topic. I love how, in the winter, I look outside and cannot simply imagine any other world except white on white, frozen silence, the amazing variety of types of cold stuff that falls out of the sky. And then in the summer I look outside and cannot imagine for a minute that the landscape would look like anything other than lush green, a gazillion birds & bugs, the hummingbirds in the red trumpet vines, the tomatoes growing insanely prolific in the garden, the grass always needing mowing, bunnies hopping about, squirrels and chipmunks running on rocks… OK, so I like the changes. If you want to live in a place where the weather is the same all year around (and wonderfully the same — say 70-80 all year) go live in Uganda! Sameness is boring and where did I put my snowshoes??

But it’s still January…. time goes by very fast and some days it seems like it should be February by now, especially since all the stores are on Valentines Day commercially…. But it’s still January. We have a long time to go before spring. I hope I won’t miss the transition in my office with no outside views.