The other night was very chilly in Joburg - chilly enough to
require long-sleeve shirt and long pants. It was a preview of things to
come and reminded me why, or just one of the many reasons why, winter is not my
friend.
I am astounded and
highly disturbed by my physiological response to cold. I become a bear sensing
winter coming on and everything in me propels me to pack on the fat to get
through the coming food-scarce months. I have triple helpings and crave dessert;
cravings I mostly give into.
I’m not sure if bears do this also, but as if by some unspoken decree
of mother nature, I, without plan or thought, one evening switch from drinking
white wine to red. Just like that. (not
that that is a bad thing.)
Day after chilly day I eat, getting rounder and plumper, in
preparation for the inevitable day when nuts and berries are no longer
available. Well, shocking as this news may come to the part of my brain
that thinks otherwise, I am not a bear living off the land and nuts and berries
remain plentiful throughout the year in my little world.
I refuse to embrace this animal part of me that makes no sense in
today’s world - or my today's world. Rather this winter I
will beat mother bear back with a stick.
Or maybe I’ll invite her to have a glass of red wine with me and
then to be on her way before I sit down to my normal size dinner.
Oh fooey. I just wrote a long response but it didn't get "published." I don't know why. But a couple of "non-bear-winter" things: I still don't have my 2012 calendar???? I love your blogs. Article (okay: 3 things) in yesterday's NYT Science Times about circumscision & HIV. Interesting new device that eliminates surgery but it sounded as if South Africa wasn't involved in that new device (funded by Bill Gates: a ring sort of thing that cuts off the circulation instead of cutting whatever it is off. Like the syntax? Love you all. Have you gone & returned from Jordan?
ReplyDelete"I do have the most profound respect for the way he [Darwin] doggedly pursued his vision of the history of life on Earth and how great things are caused by little things. Mountains move up by smal increments, the soil of the Earth is recycled through earthworms, coral reefs grow by tiny incnrements over tens of thousands of years. No one can see these things happening. One has to be able to imagine them happening. And Darwin had that wonderful imagination. He had the capacity to sit still or stand still in a field or in a wood for an hour at a time, and just watch and listen. There are few of us who have that today, and we're the worse for it." James Moore, Darwin biographer in an interview with Krista Tippett. Needless to say, I thought of you and the Small Stuff. You were right when we talked of it: Life IS the Small Stuff!! And we SHOULD "sweat the small stuff." Love you. me
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