How many times have I done this in my life? I know that snow is coming, and I want to stay up all night, hoping that it will start before first light. It's probably not really due until late tomorrow afternoon, but I'm excited NOW. I love snow. Not the shoveling part, or the walking on crunchy, crusted-over piles of the stuff that makes me feel unstable on my feet. I like watching it come down from the sky. I like watching the features of the landscape disappear into an undulating blanket of white. I like feeling chilled by the sight of it, while I'm inside a warm house, with a sweating window between me and it. I'm willing to put up with the ache in my hands from the cold climate here to live somewhere that I get to watch snow with the eyes of a child as the first half-century of my life winds down. You'd think that I'd be over it by now, but I am not. I doubt I ever will be.
I woke early this morning with a fire under my posterior to get up and clean. I ignored everything else in favor of doing just that today. All of my efforts to clean out and rearrange my bedroom in the last six months barely amounted to changing sheets and tidying. I did considerably more than that today. I pulled major components out of the room, swept and swept again, pulled out the bed, rearranged a couple pieces of furniture. I found my passport and social security card lying on the heat register directly under my pillow. Not sure why they were there and not in the fire safe, but I'm glad I have eyes on them now. I spun my big mattress around, because trying to move out of my body groove has made sleeping less comfortable for a while now. I probably should have asked for help on that part, because a quick walk around the perimeter of the grocery store later this evening was the last straw, and I irritated the muscles I strained trying to manhandle a king mattress by myself. I moved my bookshelves so that I had less of a rodeo-chute feeling on my side of the bed, and reorganized my novel collection. I pulled down Mr X's favorite painting, so he can have it, and put another one by the same artist in its place. And as I write, late at night, I'm wondering whether I finished putting the last of the blankets into the dryer. I might have that cold waiting-for-snow feeling I'm so keen on after all. But better cold in a deeply clean room than warm in a dusty, untidy one.
I still haven't learned when to stop before I've gone too far. I felt myself fatiguing several times during my efforts, but I was determined to complete the entire task. I'd tell myself that sitting down would be wise, and that demon on the other shoulder would point out that it wouldn't do to leave half a load of unfolded laundry in the dryer if I wanted to sleep under covers tonight, and my house rule is to fold as clothes exit the dryer, so I couldn't sit down until it was done. And once I had them done, I had to take them into the dressing room at least, even if they weren't hung up yet. And carrying a stack of clothes past a coat draped on the back of a chair reminded me to hang up the coat before it was covered in cat hair. And so it went. I wanted to sit down and play games, but I had committed to a plan. I had to finish this time. I'm going to pay for it now.
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