We broke a record this morning.  Not the kind of record you want to get excited about and certainly one you don’t want to repeat.  Our low temperature hit -17 this morning.  It beat the old record by 2 degrees.  Woo hoo!  It’s always funny watching the weatherman get slightly giddy when talking about it.  And then he says, something about dangerous wind chills this weekend of 35-40 degrees below zero.  I thought he was going to have a little party.  Of course he warned us to keep animals in and gave everyone the whole safety spiel about frostbite and the like, but we usually see this kind of excitement only reserved for tornado season.

In this part of the country, it’s like a badge of honor to brave the ridiculous temperatures this time of year.  Here I’m bundled up in a couple of layers and a parka to go out today and I’m seeing these teenagers in sneakers with no socks and hoodies.  If we had been out long enough I’m sure we would have seen some ex high school football player braving the sub zero temps while wearing shorts and a hoodie.

People start talking about things like “I remember when…” and “shoot, this is nothing compared to…”.   There are always colder temperatures, more snow, more ice and this little  cold snap is nothing compared to all of that.  Those who choose to live in this part of the country live here because during some times of the year it is beautiful with clear blue skies and green fields with furnace winds blowing from the south.  Did I say furnace winds?  Anyway, nothing like living in a place where there can be a 120 degree differential from summer to winter.  Explains the roads buckling, that’s for sure.

Those who have always lived here really go with the flow and seem prepared for just about anything.  I on the other hand just pray that a streak of beautiful weather will continue or maybe we won’t have those awful wind chills with ice and/or snow.  What is it they say about insanity?  In my case it’s still living here and expecting different weather.  We had that discussion again today as we froze going from the car to the grocery store and back to the car.  Normally not very far, but today it felt like miles from the parking space.  We both hate this weather.  Then why do we stay?  Therein lies the complexity of the situation.

In our culture, it’s perfectly acceptable for children to grow up and move away (although it’s really nice for all of them to be in town) because you expect them to spread their wings and look for new adventures and opportunities.  Very seldom do you hear about parents moving away from their children and possibly grandchildren.  If anything, you want to move closer to everyone.  It certainly makes things complicated.  Move somewhere warm and preferably close to salt water or stay and be a part of our children’s lives?  On a secondary level, we have lived and worked here for a third of our lives now.  We have close friends and have built careers here.  It doesn’t mean we couldn’t start again somewhere else but unfortunately we also live in a culture that practices ageism.  Although perfectly capable of working for a while longer (if we wanted to),  getting someone to hire us might be a different thing.

So, where exactly am I going with this?  Good question.  I’m still asking myself that same question.  At what point do you just take the step to be where it is you want to be?  I have this fear, that one day when we’ve both retired and have the freedom to go where we want that something will happen to one or both of us and it will shatter the dream.  The dream of traveling, of living in another place, to have more adventures with each other.  It is a challenge for sure.  In the meantime, we’ll keep plugging along, turning up the heat, wearing layers, sitting under cozy throws and loving those heated seats in the car.  And keeping in mind that it’s only 82 days until spring.