It seems like every other one of these posts — or is it every one? — has something to do with the winter blues. I keep trying to shake them. I thought that last week’s whines on my woes of grey days and cold weather would have done it. But, oh no, this blue funk is not going to be dismissed that easily. Instead, I have managed to turn it into a genuine stress-inducing, tears flowing, pitiful, Woe is Me headache.
I should be forbidden to exit the house when I feel this way. I have been known to really make a big kerffule of things that, on any other day or in any other mood, never would have happened. All of this gets accentuated if I am hungry and tired.
That’s what happened yesterday. For what seemed like hours, I had shuffled along un-shovelled sidewalks to get from here to there. By the time I got home — hungry — I was beyond patience for neglectful neighbours. I never should have stopped. Why didn’t I just keep walking past his house and into mine and let it be? But, oh no, that was not going to happen. I called out, “Yo, Mike, would you please clean your sidewalks? It’s hard for me and that ice has been there since the first snow storm.” Instant Defense was thrown up. I would have done the same. Then this other guy, who was building snowmen in the front yard, popped up and told me I had nothing to complain about, he lived three hours north and had a lot more snow and a lot more sidewalk to clean. I said what did that have to do with anything? I don’t live three hours north, I live next door and have to walk by this house every day. Then he did it. He completed the deterioration of my spirit. He started singing,
So this is Xmas
And what have you done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
The sarcasm reeked from his voice. There was nothing to be done but slump my way up the stairs to my house where I could have a good cry in private. And cry I did, which didn’t change anything but did make me feel better. Unfortunately, the tears also upset the cats, which should have upset me but didn’t.
Then I remember something that I knew would lift my spirits and make all of the blues seem not so dark and, maybe even, brighten these holidays and that Big 7-oh-oh-Oh birthday. Maggie Rose! Seeing this picture just sent my spirits soaring and the blues shaded to a light aqua.
Maggie Rose giving her Great Aunt Ann a Smile Full of Joy
It must have magically seeped into the neighbour’s house too — it is Christmas, after all — because I heard the scraping of the sidewalk being cleaned.
Annie's Odyssey 