Opinion

So, January is many things, but I think the word most people use to describe it is “long”. Yes, technically it’s tied for the longest month of the year with others but I’d like to see any other month look hard and long into the cold, grey eyes of January and see who blinks first.

Contemplating the fact that it’s about 50 degrees warmer inside my refrigerator than it is outside as I write this, my thoughts go back to the indigenous people who survived in our outside winter environment for millennia. Yet, amid those challenges, they did manage to eke out a subsistence existence season after season.

I see my complaints to Mother Nature about the seesawing temperatures didn't do any good. We've been swinging again this week. All day Thursday the weathermen were telling us that the highs would be in the 30s. They even announced that as the actual temp. All the while the thermometer on my dash was reading in the single digits and the wind was whooping it up. Gave me a giggle anyway. Really pining for spring.

After months of having to hear from my mother, my sister, my grandmother, and my husband how terrible my previous column photo was, I decided to change it. Not because I thought it was terrible, because honestly, who cares? My column picture isn't a beauty contest, and I'm 40. I hardly see why it makes a difference. However, I just got sick of hearing how "old" I looked from all of them - thus, here's a quick photo from my porch featuring my seventeen-year-old hat that I originally purchased at the Minnesota Newspaper Association. This hat was a purchase made the very first time I attended the convention. Back then I was just a young, perhaps overly ambitious newspaper owner who was asked to speak, as a part of a panel, to a group of journalism students about the nitty-gritty of what living a life of journalism is like.

The birds are looking extra puffy this morning. Mighty nippy out there. And, of course, this was the morning I misplaced my choppers. I bought them a couple of years ago in a Clearance bin at an Alexandria grocery store. Good deerskin mitts with fleece inside. I ended up buying many pairs after friends tried mine. Fortunately, I have an extra pair that is a little big for me, but it worked well this morning. Temp was near -20 when Patton and I made our round in Milan. But, we got it done.

“Gardening” per se, doesn’t stop during our Minnesota winter, at least not some of the preparation work that prefaces planting seeds in the ground come spring. One such cold-weather gardening task for green-thumbers is creating/maintaining compost.

This weekend's snowstorm marked the first time I had to pull the snowblower out of the garage this season. I'm fairly proud of my snowblowing abilities, as I just learned how to use the machine (thanks, You- Tube) two winters ago. Previously, I enjoyed (just kidding on the enjoying part) a full shoveling workout experience. However, living in a house on a hill on a corner lot with all of the city sidewalks surrounding the lot and a half deep property, as well as all of the sidewalks up to the three doors of the house in every direction, a snowblower became a must.

Well, we survived the day-long snowstorm on Friday. Thankfully, it ended before nightfall, so there was time to clear some of the snow right away. I spent the day and night in town at Jon's house, since I didn't know how soon my snow plowing person could get to my house and get the snow cleared so I could drive out. You know, it would be a tragedy if I was snowbound for any length of time. When did I turn into someone that absolutely needed to leave my house every day? Uff.

With all the fancy, plush, heated ice houses and the hi-tech, wind-breaker tents, today’s ice fishermen/ women have it pretty nice. Even the guy squatting for hours on an overturned five-gallon bucket seems way too content for his/her environment. But that’s what fishing’s all about - even in winter.