One of the benefits of living in the great Northeast is that you occasionally get a “snow day”, when work is cancelled and you get an extra holiday. In an area of the country where we are highly driven and always fully scheduled, it would seem providential that we sometimes are given an excuse to take a break, and do things we wouldn’t ordinarily be able to justify the time for. Hence this mid-week blog on a lighter note, which really has little to do with politics.
Despite the welcome snow day, I still let out a little sigh upon seeing the fresh blanket of nearly a foot of snow this morning. More shoveling! My son has a plow, but I still prefer to shovel, I’m funny that way… I do it for the exercise, a little hard work is good for you! Enough snow and you don’t need rowing machines, treadmills, gym memberships or fancy exercise programs to stay in shape. I would post an Geraldo Rivera style selfie here to prove my point, but at almost 60 I’m wiser than that, and not that drunk!
Having completed my morning snow clearing, I returned to the warmth of my home and the usual notifications from my southern friends on FaceBook. Most of them are transplants from up here, so they enjoy a little good natured ribbing at our expense. Of course, by the time we get to February here the constant jabs about our weather from multiple fair weather friends do begin to get a little tedious. We get it. You don’t like the snow. That’s probably why you moved south. We don’t mind it that much, that’s probably why we haven’t! But if you do see it as so dreadful, it’s odd the way you express your sympathy through ridicule! It is an interesting piece of human nature that our pleasure is heightened by someone else’s misery. I suppose these same people would have texted the victims of Katrina about how pleasant the dry spell was in their neck of the woods.
Of course, natives of the south seem to be able appreciate their homes without feeling the need to deprecate other’s. There’s nothing worse than a proselyte for pointing out how wonderful their conversion turned out, and how everyone else should follow suit. I wonder sometimes who they are trying to convince; as if in jeopardy of buyer’s remorse they feel the need to justify their sacrifice to themselves and everyone else. Maybe they’re trying to convince others to join them by pointing out how miserable we all should be. I’m sorry. This is our home, and we love it; we are content here. There are a few whiners and complainers here, we will extend your invitation to them, maybe you will enjoy their company more than we have!
IMHO: Living in New York, you need to develop kind of a thick skin. We have rough winters, embarrassing government, and some of the most outrageously liberal nitwits in the country. We are often the brunt of jokes. Still, be it ever so humble, there’s no place quite like home. I’ve travelled all over the country, but found no place more beautiful. It’s fun to visit other states, but I always love coming home, no matter the weather or the politics. No state is without it’s deficiencies, we New Yorkers could certainly point those out, but better to see the good in your own home without running down someone else’s. Yeah, it’s February in New York… have your fun at our expense, we’ll even laugh with you… a sense of humor is one thing you need in New York. But please understand we love it here; it can be rough, but it’s not Siberia, it’s not Hell… it’s not California!
Right on, Kevin. One of my wife’s ancestors was born aboard a ship sailing for the British West Indies in 1810. He became a deep sea diver and a sailor himself. For a time he was the harbor master in Liverpool, England. I’m not sure what brought him to the Hudson Valley but he had seen the world. The family lore is that when he arrived here, he declared that of all the places he had ever seen, the Hudson River Valley was the most pleasant. He settled in Poughkeepsie, built a ship yard that built yachts, and produced a son who became the first comptroller of Vassar College. But among his major achievement was fathering a family which produced my wife. Thanks Kevin for the reminder of how blessed we are to live in a region so close to Eden – except for the snow.