Snowpocalypse. An unbelievable amount has fallen onto what was already there, and it’s still coming — will be 50 centimetres, over a foot and a half. My upstairs tenant flew out to her other home down south yesterday, thank God, rather than today, because all flights have been cancelled. Ruth and I were supposed to have apéritif with a neighbour, but even walking five or six blocks is too much. Nobody has shovelled yet. What a winter.
So I’ve spent a solitary, very quiet day watching the snow and … yes … doomscrolling. Reading news. Must stop. I just read someone who wrote, Give yourself 15 minutes a day of news and then stop. Focus on what you can make better in your surroundings; care for your family, your neighbours and friends. Don’t founder into helpless rage and grief.
Good advice, as that’s what I’ve been feeling.
Had a great Italian dinner on a cold night with old friend Keith Sjogren and his wife Dorothy. Keith and I acted in Pinter’s The Homecoming in 1969, but he went on to make a sensible living in banks, and I did not.
I’ve been watching a documentary on Mel Brooks: The 99-year old Man. Interesting and very funny, it’s what I can stand right now. Right now, listening to Cross Country Check-up about Carney’s speech, Canadians calling in, almost all favourable. A++, Mr. PM.
This is what I wrote on FB, with the photos: “What’s the problem?! says the cat, I’m safe and warm. And so am I, never more grateful, not just for a roof and furnace — and a good supply of chocolate and a recently filled bird feeder — but for Canada. For peace, order, and good government, for grownups in the room, for the conspicuous absence of a murderous gang of fascist thugs slaughtering citizens in the street. Overjoyed to live here even in a snowpocalypse, like today, a long very quiet day. Perfect for reading Margaret Atwood’s 560-page memoir from my local public library. Go Peggy. Go Canada. May our southern neighbours regain control of their democracy and send every single despicable lying sociopath, of whom there are an amazing number, to oblivion.”
Looking right now, there’s over two feet of snow pushing against my back door. I’m going to have a mighty load of shovelling to do tomorrow. Luckily it’s light and fluffy. So far.
The fabulous news is that another old friend, Anita, has invited me to share her rental flat in Malaga for a few days in April. Southern Spain? Hell yes! So I’m thinking about April travel, as usual, where to go and when. Anita and I were roommates at the writing workshop in Siena in about 2004, where I first met and worked with Wayson. She and I liked each other immediately; she lives in Helsinki but travels for work, and a few years later I stayed with her in Rome. We’ve not met in 20 years but maybe it’ll happen in April, in the sun.
Greetings from my snow cave. Dreaming of Malaga. Arriba y adelante!
