I’m not dead—just lying low. It’s what I usually do in January, the longest and coldest of months here in Salt Lake City. And by longest, I mean it just goes on and on and on with nary a trace of sunshine on my shoulders. So I just stay inside, gazing out frosted windows and wishing I were somewhere else—say on a tropical beach somewhere closer to the equator. But, alas, I’m not a migratory snowbird but more like a hibernating bear. In fact, my wife calls me “Bearsie.”
Above is a picture I shot from out my west-facing window: Rime frosted wisteria seed pods backlit by a distant street lamp, one of just a handful of street lamps on Harrison Avenue that still lights up at night. So what happened to the others? I’m told it has to do with electrical problems that no one has the know-how or energy to fix. Great!
In my garage sits a BMW motorbike with a trickle charger attached to the battery. Come spring, I’ll disconnect it from life support and take it for a ride. Until then, I’m suffering not only from SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), but also PMS (Parked Motorcycle Syndrome).
Perhaps the worst thing about January is that it follows December—a month that I associate with celebrations and holiday cheer. Also, it is followed by February, a month when members of my family tend to die. However, I’m not expecting any disturbing phone calls this time around because I just crunched the numbers and realize that I’m next in line to croak. My only hope is that I can somehow manage to keep breathing until March, which is also a very long month, but at least it leads to April.
April! I was born in April way the hell back in the previous century. At the time, my parents lived in a house less than a mile from where I live today. But when I was two, we packed up and moved away, so I didn’t grow up here. And yet I feel an affinity. I’m like an old salmon who swam upstate to spawn and then, presumably, die.
My own son, meantime, has grown up and moved away to California, where he has learned to surf. As I write this, he could very well be riding a wave. Will he ever consider returning to the place where he was born? All depends, I suppose, on rising sea levels.
