My Smart Mouth: April Shut-ins

Normally, I’m not one for complaining about the weather.

Several times this winter I was heard to remind my better half that he chooses to live in the mountains and thus snow and cold weather are to be expected and besides, isn’t it beautiful?

I even took a sort of weird, nostalgic pleasure in experiencing a “real” winter, like the ones I remember from a childhood spent trudging through snowdrifts (uphill both ways) to meet the school bus. But, with March coming in like a lion and going out like an a-hole, even I have reached the limits of my tolerance for winter weather.

It’s not like I expect April in Lincoln to be balmy but…seriously, come on. Yesterday, I saw snowflakes the size of a baby’s hand! I’m thoroughly sick of packing firewood and ice skating across the driveway to check the mail, and I know I’m not the only one.

Mother Nature needs to cut us a break before the entire town goes collectively homicidal, and looking at the extended forecast, I’m afraid the safest option might be to not leave our homes for the next month.

Personally, I’ve never found it difficult to fill my day with any number of indoor pursuits when inclement weather discourages gardening, horseback riding or outdoor drinking. In fact, shutting myself up in my house and not answering the door for a month sounds like a little slice of heaven. An accomplished self-soother from way back, I haven’t been bored in 30 years and I have a hard time understanding how any literate human over the age of eight has ever been bored since the invention of the printing press. For me, the simple act of dusting the magazine stack in my bathroom can turn into an hour-long foray into the wonders of the January/February 2005 issue of Archaeology magazine (yes, I used to have a subscription – something my best friend once told me I should stop telling people).

I have it on good authority that not everyone likes to read.

Ok, that gives you more time for my second-favorite activity: cleaning. The beauty of housekeeping is, it just never ends. By the time you get one part of the house ship shape the bathrooms already need cleaning and there are cobwebs hanging from the ceiling fans.

Although I am certain I spend at least a third of my life cleaning, my house never seems to achieve perfect cleanliness, across the board. I try not to give much thought to the element of futility that implies, preferring to focus instead on the smug feeling of personal righteousness and order in the universe brought on by a good day-long manic cleaning session.

Weirdly enough, I have observed that a good percentage of the population actually seems to not enjoy housekeeping. If you don’t have a good book handy, and you’re not into spending your life scrubbing baseboards, what are you supposed to do while cooped up for the entire month of April, trying not to murder your neighbor?

You could spend the time watching reality television, but only if you like to observe yourself, and the rest of the country, getting stupider. For those of us who prefer not to think about the general devolution of modern humanity, there must be other ways to entertain ourselves while Mother Nature continues to indulge in her little tantrum.

Here are a few quick suggestions I thought up while scrubbing my shower door so hard it fell apart:

Plan to re-stage all of the iconic family photos from your childhood. Bust out those photo albums, look around for the right outfits and props, and start working on your siblings.

Excavate your freezer and cook what you find. Challenge yourself to use up that package marked “elk ’15.” Get creative with your consumption and let me know what you tried. But, don’t invite me over to share it, because I’m not leaving my house.

Get a pen-pal. You could choose a friend or relative with whom to correspond or visit a site like http://www.penpaals.com to connect with a complete stranger. True, you could just text a friend or troll someone on the internet, but there’s nothing like the excitement of getting an actual card or letter in the mail. Just maybe avoid the prison pen-pal, ok?

Create an online dating profile for your dog. No, really – this exists. At MatchPuppy.com, your dog can meet other like-minded canine friends. What kind of insane person does this, you ask? Well, considering that the Huffington Post reported way back in 2012 that one in ten pets now has a social media profile, I’d say quite a few. And most of them don’t have the excuse of being snowed in in April.