The Best Thing About Winter is . . .

I have decided that the best thing about winter in Canada is flannelette sheets.  After a cold winter day, they feel so warm and comforting to climb into at night.  They seem warm even when you first get into bed, unlike cotton or silk sheets in summer.  They welcome you into their comfort as if to say, “Come and let me snuggle you for the night”.  As you may guess from that admission, I’m not much of a winter person.  I don’t ski and I don’t skate any more.  After walking a couple of blocks to get to work on the coldest days in Ottawa, I no longer relish walking anywhere.  I no longer get any satisfaction from shoveling snow which is why I pay a snow clearing service to do it for me.  Even my dog does not like to go for a walk on a winter’s day.  My wife and I don’t travel south in winter.  After a couple of weeks of warmth, it is just too horrific to return to the snow and cold. I’m an indoor person.  I do get a lot of writing and projects done in the winter, but it is no substitute for being able to get outside.

Summer, on the other hand, is the time when we thrive.  We get the gazebo put up and move the patio furniture out.  The gazebo is like another room in our house.  We talk and read in our glider rockers.  We eat out there as much as we can.  I barbeque. We watch our dog running around looking alive or basking in the sun on her outdoor bed. Even when it rains, we have clear curtains to keep us dry.  And all the while, we soak up the heat.  Neither of us minds the heat.  We’ve lived in the US south where heat and humidity are much worse than here. 

My favourite activity in summer is golf.  My father introduced me to the game when I was thirteen at a par three course and driving range. My father had learned the game in Scotland in the 1920s and had even played in Shanghai, China when he lived and worked out there in the 1930s.  By fourteen I was playing on a regular course and before I went to college at eighteen, I was scoring in the low eighties.  College and the early years in the Navy and family life kind of slowed down my regular play, but I still golfed whenever I could.  I played in many interesting places.  I played in the fog at the military course, Hartland Point, in Halifax.  I played at a course in Charleston, South Carolina where the signs on the edge of the fairway admonished you to beware of the snakes and alligators.  That sure made you keep your shots going straight.  I played on a US Navy course in Panama when it was so humid a club slipped out of the hands of one of my playing partners and lodged in a tree.  I played on a course high above Monte Carlo where if you hooked your ball on one hole, it was liable to land on the casino.  I played in Scotland where I borrowed the pro’s clubs, but they didn’t make my play any better.  I have played in five of Canada’s provinces where one of my favourite courses is an out-of-the-way place outside New Glasgow, Nova Scotia.  I even played golf in San Francisco . . . on my honeymoon.  I’ve played well and I’ve played badly. But it doesn’t matter; I’ve enjoyed myself no matter what. 

Now that children have left home and we are retired, we usually don’t travel in summer.  We much prefer to travel in May or June, or September of early October when the weather is still good and places are quieter.  We don’t usually travel far.  Visits to our children, who all live away from Ottawa, or to favourite hotels and resorts within less than a day’s drive are the limit of our adventures.  As long as it is warm, it is good.  We do have some dream trips we hope to make.  We both love train travel, and we want to take the Rocky Mountaineer between Banff and Vancouver since we have children that live at both ends.  We would also like to take the train to Halifax to visit old friends and old haunts.  We would like to visit Scotland since we both have roots there.  These things will come but in the meantime, we’ll enjoy our summer living around home.

As the days are getting longer and warmer, those summer days are getting closer.  In the meantime, I’ll go to bed at night and bury myself in those warm, cozy flannelette sheets.