Baby Its Cold Outside

There is a distinct chill in the air. The wind blows with the whispers of winter on its way. Or maybe the wind is shouting. Today the gusts were over forty miles per hour. And for a short time, oh how I dread even bringing myself to say it, it snowed.

The chill in the air is not the bitter below-zero temperatures one experiences in the dead of a Wisconsin December. In fact, I don’t believe the temperatures even dared to fall below freezing. But there was just something about that wind that chilled a person to the core. Perhaps it is the mere thought of the horrors awaiting us in the ominous clouds of the future, the dreaded snow that will soon torture us all. Somehow just the thought of it makes me cooler, even now, in the warmth of my hotel room and sweat pants. Or perhaps it is just because it is the first of the cold winds for the season that makes us shiver. There seems to be a getting-used-to time that we all require to adjust to winter, and for me, that must have started today.

My gas tank of the bright blue Ford Taurus that I spend much of my life in these days ran tragically low this morning as I trekked from town to town. The idea of forty mile per hour winds did not entice me to step even one foot out of the car today either, but I knew I’d never make it all day without filling up. Have you ever filled up a gas tank with forty mile per hour winds blowing in your face? It was a challenge from start to finish. I staggered and stammered around the pump for a few minutes until finally the tank was full. Then I immediately sprinted inside to grab the warmest thing I could think of, a cup of gas-station-quality coffee. As soon as I had it paid for, I forged back into the tundra-like atmospheric conditions and directly to the driver’s seat.

A large gulp of hot coffee quickly warmed my entire body, but, as it turned out, I was a little over-eager to drink. And after the warmth quickly faded away, all I was left with was a scorching fire on every surface of all of my digestive organs. My mouth, my throat, even perhaps my stomach were burnt to a crisp. I guess there is a perfectly logical reason to the “Caution-Hot” warning on all Styrofoam coffee cups after all.

So, here’s to the start of that evil, uncomfortable, dangerous season we like to call winter….and to many more scorching hot coffee gulps to come.