One of those zone nights

I have always loved the snow. Even as a kid I prayed for snow. In some ways I still do. While I was at the computer working this morning something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye: someone skiing up the street. I snapped a picture. Haven't downloaded it yet, but snow inspires me. I sometimes long for the quiet and solitude of the cabin when the snow was piled up to the second floor and all over the deck. I would sit in the living room in the dark with the stove lit and the fire going and look out the glass doors onto the back deck. When the moon was full the light was blue and the sky so clear and dark the stars were close enough to touch.I usually had a cup of hot cider with a cinnamon stick in it or a big mug of hot Mexican chocolate in the recliner with an afghan around my legs and the only light the moon or the fire. It was quiet and wonder and peaceful and I miss it. I never felt alone. But there is comfort in the sounds that surround me here, the little domestic sounds of television and laughter and conversation floating through the door or up through the floor boards and the smells of cooking or incense from Nel's apartment or the simple clean fresh-wash smell of laundry. There are little sounds in the morning that remind me I am not alone: Nel showering in the morning with the bang click of the shower button going down, the sound of running water and Barbara sliding the doors open so Pastor can go out onto the deck. There is the scent of Barbara's strong vanilla coffee that wafts up through the open windows or into the hallway and under my door when I go into the kitchen. The baseboard heater ticks as water flows through the pipes and warms up the cold pipes and the comforting hum of my computer in the sun room with it's eerie green lights flashing and blinking in the darkness. I don't think I noticed the sounds and smells and feeling of a place quite so much when I was married or the kids were around because every morning was a controlled chaos of rushed dressing and meals and bundling up in the cold to take the kids to school or the babysitter's and for me to get to work on time. I wonder if that's what happens to people in marriages, if they are so busy and rushed they don't take the time to appreciate the small sounds and sights and smells around them that remind them there is something more than work and errands and bills and all the thousand little things they feel they must do before it's time to drop spent and worn into bed before it's time to get up and do it all over again.