Baby, it’s cold outside!
Those three ladies in the basement, Billie Jo, Betty Jo and Bobbie Jo, have been working hard this week. As soon as the snow flakes stopped falling last Friday, the temperatures started falling. By Monday, the high temperature was 1. Tuesday morning dawned in the teens below zero with nasty wind chills. Wednesday practically felt like a heat wave with temperatures climbing into the upper-teens above zero by mid-afternoon. But temperatures began falling again Thursday, with more sub-zero weather forecast for Friday, before the daytime temperatures eventually get back above freezing by Monday.
The bitter cold was a shock to our systems. Even though this is winter in Wisconsin, January was a very mild month with temperatures about 10 degrees above average. One reason for that was the blanket of clouds we have had over us since Christmas. Only on rare occasions did those clouds part and give us a glimpse of Brother Sun over the past several weeks. So the upside of the chilly temperatures was blue skies and the bright light of Brother Sun. At least the sun made it seem warmer when looking out the window.
We didn’t have to go outside to know that the bright sunshine was giving us a false sense of warmth, though. In an old house like this, there’s not much you can do to keep the cold out, especially when the wind seems to blow right through the walls. So you put on an extra layer and thank God that those ladies keep chugging along, huffing and puffing clouds of warm exhaust out into the courtyard while doing their best to offset Mother Nature’s chill inside.
It seems life is full of upsides and downsides, pluses and minuses, like winter’s bright sunshine and blue skies coming along with bitter cold temperatures, or winter’s cloudy skies providing milder temperatures. You learn to enjoy the upsides and accept the downsides, especially when you know you can’t control either anyway. You learn to be grateful that you have resources to deal with the downsides, like warm clothes, safe shelter and working boilers. Hopefully, you also learn to have compassion for those without resources: the poor, the homeless, or those not accustomed to such cold weather like those in the southern regions of our nation dealing with freezing temperatures, snow, ice and freezing rain this week.
For all of life’s upsides and downsides, for the joy of the upsides and the resources to deal with the downsides, and for the compassion we can learn from the downsides, we say Deo Gratias!