The Weather Outside Is Frightful

Drusy demonstrates exceptional flatness.

Yesterday, I dragged my new maroon bicycle down a small flight of stairs, across what passes for a lawn and into the street. Then I rode to work at the family store, pretending I didn't look or feel like Angela Lansbury in the opening credits of Murder, She Wrote. No, no! I am far more rugged and burly! I am fierce! I am also smaller than I at first appear, so dragging the bicycle down a twisting flight of stairs inside the family store exhausted me completely. Anya, laughing hysterically, said, "Plainly the workout is when you get off the bike." No kidding. She would not have enjoyed watching me walk the bike through her store full of beautiful things after closing, which I will never ever describe to her and hope she never sees.

Man, I hope I got all the little pieces!

Yesterday.

Last night, it started snowing. This morning, I looked out my front window and said, "No way, I'm risking my life for the unnamed university. This cowgirl's going back to bed." When I woke up twenty years later, I shaved and looked outside again. Oh, those kids with their rock music and snow plows! There's a path out of the cul-de-sac by the river and Pete reports the roads aren't so bad. Still, my laundry's washed. As it dries it humidifies my arid apartment.

Today.

I'm making a shopping list. Cat litter, coffee, unbleached filters, hand soap, special overpriced shampoo for my overpriced hair, body wash, NyQuil, eggs, vegetables. It's raining outside, turning the slippery layer of pressed snow into slush. I hate this step in the thaw but let's be realistic. Siobhan and I have a date with Suzette for martinis tonight, and I am loath to get my paws wet. Staying dry will require ingenuity. I'm considering building my own diving bell.

Two days ago, Daria returned from Virginia with another carload of stuff that used to be Dad's. This time, more jars for jarring spring fruits and vegetables. In a few weeks, we'll stage a final garage sale, then our stepmother Darla will pack up and go back to Canada with her cats. I regard these new items with some nervousness. A time is coming when Dad's death and all events rippling through our lives for the last year will smooth out into the flatness of History. I am not sure how I feel about that and I can tell Daria isn't either. In the meantime, my grandmother's, then Dad's convection oven has a new home with me.

I do not know how to use it but I will learn that, too.