Of Frigid Temperatures and the Surviving of Them

It is frigid.  Really.  When I finally checked the temperature mid-morning it was 10 degrees below  zero!  And now that it's mid-afternoon the temperature has risen to a balmy 5 degrees below zero.  How do we Minnesotans survive?  I don't really know.  We just do. 

I'll tell you one thing, we're not going anywhere today.  I'd prefer to stay indoors today, if it's all right with you, thank you!  It does help having a gas fireplace in the downstairs family room.  I also enjoyed a nice, steaming cup of hot tea this morning.  Sweatshirts and jeans are appropriate apparel for inside the house.  If I were to go outdoors (which I'm not) I would have to do a lot more bundling up than that!  We're talking long johns underneath the jeans, thick socks, boots, puffy down coat, gloves, scarf, and hat.  But I'm not going out, so I don't have to worry about it.

Tomorrow we have to go out.  The girls have their piano lessons.  I will be starting the car early to let it warm up.  Thank goodness for car heaters and home furnaces!  I can't imagine living when Laura Ingalls Wilder lived.  She lived in Minnesota for a time, you know.  How did they survive?  If we were to ask her she'd probably say:  "I don't really know.  We just did."

You'd think I'd be used to these winter temperatures by now.  I grew up here in Minnesota.  I went to college in Northern Wisconsin.  I've never lived anywhere else.  But I'm not!  This body craves warmer temperatures and climes.  Oh for the warm sun to let its rays warm my cheeks on a sandy beach somewhere!  But I have to wait. 

But I don't have to wait quite as long as I normally do for that to happen this year.  Yes, this year we are going to Florida in the middle of winter!  Yay!  This soul rejoices at the prospect.  Yes, I can hold on for just a few more weeks.  I can make it.  I think I can, I think I can, I think I can . . . .

Until then, I'll eat hot things, drink hot things, and wear warm things, all the while staying in my warm house.  And I will survive.