Winter Doldrums

 Winter Doldrums
Feeling the winter wearies is another malady that afflicts a couch potato person during the chill winter months. It’s more than “cabin fever” where a soul is sated by going outside of the home to visit a fdriend or to make a shopping run. It is more apt to appear near the end of the season, but this year the extreme cold and the continued nagging bits of snowfall seems to have affectedd me this week.
The first snowfall is often greeted with wide open arms and expectant eyes. It’s truly a welcome sight, covering the bareness of the trees and fallen brown leaves with a bright white robe of eiderdown and lace. Slowly as the shoveling snow, the intense cold, the scraping of the ice accumulates builds, the repeated sight of the pristine white drifts becomes unwelcome. I’ve grown weary of the bleak gray days that seem to blur one into another and I begin to long for the spring melt, the sunshine, and the warm breezes. I’ve grown weary of dragging my shovel out to my driveway to keep the driveway open in case I should need to leave in an emergency. The thoughts of Punxsutawney Phil does little to lift my spirits out of these dreary doldrum days of winter.Especially if he should share will be six more weeks of the winter wearies. SIGH.
I’ve grown weary of carefully waltzing my way across the icy surface of my driveway to gather the mail. I have to be extremely cautious not to fall. My slip and fall in 2015 has made me more aware of just how dangerous ice can be. I don’t want another head injury. There were two bleeds in my head at that time. The injury that occurred from the fall was more than enough.
I can’t wait until the gentle prying fingers of the vernal equinox, the gentle zephyrs, and the warmth of sunshine will chase the winter wearies away thus year. The still distant time for those dreary winter days are just a dream. I long for the snow to be replaced with bright colorful days of spring. Maybe I should rip several pages from the calendar and pretend that spring has arrived.
Alas it isn’t so. The recent icy blast and the white heaps of snow remain. Another wintery blast with its coat of white snow is predicted. It will bury my still sleeping crocuses, daffodils, and forsythia blooms beneath its chilly burden. My thoughts of spring have been dashed.  I want warm so this old bear will stay inside and hibernate.