Something About the Cold

Rain for days. I can´t get any outdoor work done, I´ve been imprisoned at this computer screen for 20 hours. I´ve developed a twitch in my left thigh, and after Gary´s near-death experience, I´m convinced it´s a blood clot. That´s silly of course. Tons of people sit at a computer screen daily, for 8 hours straight. They´re called "gamers". But that´s not the life for me. I finished today´s database entry and said (to myself), "screw the rain, I´m going for a walk". It´s been freezing all morning; I´ve lost sensation in my left pinky toe. I have on two long-sleeved shirts, and two pairs of socks (if you didn´t know me in college, I walked around in the snow in slippers, so socks are kind of a big deal). But I couldn´t take sitting any longer, borrowed an umbrella, and headed toward La Llacuna. There´s a two-lane paved road, riddled with curves, and no walkway. It was pretty foolhardy to walk it in the rain, but I passed about one vehicle in two miles, so I was fine.
There´s something about being freezing cold, it makes you forget everything except the sensation of your body. Whatever stresses consume your normal thoughts fall from your mind, and are replaced with "cold bones" and "cold skin". My nose and cheeks tingled and were, I´m sure, as ruddy as the day I went skiing in the Rockies as a four-year-old (Dad!). My fingers automatically curled into my jacket sleeve, my pinky toe became re-invigorated. A likeness I felt once before, in a river in West Virginia. Late spring, the air was sweltering, the water icy. After shingling a roof all day, I jumped in the river and, instantly chilled through, cried out, "I´ve never felt so alive!" Something about the cold...
The rain unexpectedly magnifies all colors, despite the gray, sunless sky. Everything was in shades of green and white. Wispy cotton snagged the tops of evergreens in the valley. Tree trunks were brush-stroked, like Japanese pottery, with cream and green tea. A huddle of wild mushrooms, like spilled pools of white paint snuck out of the dewy green grass. All encompassed by the incessant beat of rain drops on my umbrella, and the cautious conversation of two unseen birds. I´d never felt so alive.

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