The Snow Diaries

Savoring the slow days

Along with the middle of the country, we recently experienced a blizzard. Predictions were dire but in the end we got about seven inches. More importantly, the power didn’t go out (yet. Knock on wood.)

This is the second time since we moved to the mountain where we’ve had snowfall that stretched over more than 24 hours. That first time was at the tiny cabin we built; we watched the snow pile up on the deck with glee, wondering if we be snowed in. For how many days? The unknown brought an undercurrent of danger.

From that earlier big snowfall

This time around, it’s been more cozy than worrisome. It started with frozen drizzle, lightly, on Saturday, changed to intermittent light snowfall on Sunday, and then steady but wispy snowfall throughout Monday. By Tuesday morning (today, as I write this) the snow had stopped and the sun came out. The temps are going to be below freezing all week so we’re not anticipating much snow melt.

It’s been surprisingly peaceful. Hours writing interspersed with hours reading or napping with dogs. The bed in my office (I suppose, technically, no more than my desk moved into the guestroom) is heaped with blankets for the dogs. Six pillows. It’s hard to resist crawling in the middle of this pile with my laptop, ostensibly to “work”.

The only real work getting done is cooking. A trip to the grocery store a day before the precipitation started meant we had supplies. We’re prepared. There’s been a meatloaf, mac and cheese from scratch, roast chicken and gravy, chicken soup. This afternoon I’m going to make a blueberry crumb cake, which I normally make only in summer. I tell myself that shoveling snow will work off those extra calories. Right.

The view outside my dining room; that cake

The shoveling is for the dogs. As any dog owner will tell you, it can be hard getting dogs to relieve themselves when their favorite spots are covered with snow. We shovel tracks through the snow, clear down to leaves and dirt. The longer we’re snowed in, the more we shovel, until the yard looks terrible, all churned snow and dirt.

I’m taking a break from the next book under contract to work on a story idea. After a week and a half and I have a strong first draft, 15K words and roughly 45 pages. It’s been a luxury to step away from the book, something I rarely do when I’m on the clock (or calendar, I guess, more correctly). But since the contract hasn’t been signed yet, I’m clinging to that technicality.

Okay, it’s Thursday afternoon. I drove down the mountain for the first time today to pick up a few groceries. It broke the spell; it feels less like a magical respite and more like normal times. I’m back at work on my WIP, thoughts of it filling my head like a switch has flipped.

Now it’s just winter again. Dirty snow and icy patches. Oh well. You have to return to reality some time. I’m just grateful for the restorative interludes.

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We all know people in southern California, no doubt. I was relieved to learn that my niece, a Hollywood make-up artist, happened to be in NYC when the fires broke out. Friends have marked themselves safe, though some were forced to evacuate. If you’d like to help contribute to disaster relief, here are some of the links I’ve seen: American Red Cross; the Los Angeles Fire Department Foundation is the official non-profit of the PA Fire Department; World Central Kitchen. You can find charitable organizations working the fire response here.

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Recommendations: Tomorrow Grady Hendrix’ latest novel, Witchcraft for Wayward Girls, comes out. You probably know Grady already for his horror novels laced with humor and nostalgia for recently passed days (like the 70s and 80s). I got an early read of Witchcraft and have to say, this is probably Grady’s best book. How do you know more about pregnancy than me, I demanded of Grady. His research is sharp. The book is fearless. Not always an easy read, but so impressive.

I said it and I’m sticking by it.

If you’re curious about the tradwife movement, like I am, you might be interested in reading Tradwife by T.C. Parker. It’s a female rage story with a true crime wrapper. Six residents of a tradwife closed community in a UK suburb are found gruesomely murdered and four years later, an author tries to solve the crime. The author is a researcher herself and her understanding of the social and psychological aspects of this conservative movement are well represented here.

TV: I finished Black Doves, a stylish UK spy thriller, and can officially give it a thumbs up. It’s about a strictly-for-profit intelligence business and the code of ethics followed by the people who end up working there. Fun watching how it weaves in and out of what we expect to see in these types of stories. While waiting for Severance, season 2 to start on the 17th, my husband and I are giving Silo, season 1 another try. It’s a dystopian science fiction thriller, with a mystery twist: the last inhabitants of a planet are forced to live in a giant silo. They can’t go outside because they believe the environment is poison. They don’t know how they came to be in the predicament they’re in because rebels/terrorists destroyed all historic records a century ago. It’s sitting better this second time around. LAST MINUTE ADDITION: We just started American Primeval on Netflix, a western set about a decade after the Donner Party but with all the same issues: religious “freedom”, forcible resettling of the native population, violence toward—well, everybody. Be forewarned, it is bloody. But if Hollywood can make this series, I have hope that someone might pick up The Hunger.