Winter                                                   Settling Moon

Kate’s lost weight; she’s now down to 115. I’m going to weigh myself today. I may have, too. If so, I’m going to introduce a new diet: the interstate moving diet. This simple diet requires only thousands of dollars and weeks of focus on your stuff. Spending the money itself might work for some, but throw in a necessary obsession with each and every item you own, including touching, packing, re-positioning each one and you have a perfect antidote to flab. Of course, for those of you who choose to follow this diet, you get, too, the focus on leaving friends and familiarity for a new spot. All of this is in its own way surprisingly positive, and it wears away at the comfortable habits that put on those extra pounds. Try it! You’ll be a believer in no more 2 0r 3 moves.

Winter                                                                      Settling Moon

Fourth snow removal this morning. My neighbor, Eduardo, with a mattock, was hacking away at snow plow deposit blocking his driveway. It slopes up from below grade. Holly was out with a snow rake removing snow from their roof. I’ve never done that. Wonder if it’s necessary?

The winds have begun, heading toward 90 mph gusts tomorrow. The pines sway with them, readied by millions of years of evolution. The lodgepoles are one of the pine species, like jackpine, whose cones only open in the heat of fire. Fire is natural here, so natural that it aids in the dispersal of the very trees it destroys. Houses aren’t like that.

Even though we’ve become  much more acclimatized a morning’s labor can still do us in. And it did today. We both took long naps. No more work for today.

Winter                                                        Settling Moon

Have a feeling there will be a settling moon II, the first in the almost 10 year history of Ancientrails. We’re making regular, steady progress, this after that, but we moved a house full of belongings and have to find new spots for everything.

The first packed, my books, may well be the last unpacked as we move through many other spaces before the loft gets my full attention. It’s had a little since I had to set up my main desktop computer. Each time I go up I open a box, take things out, put them on shelves. At some point, with the books, I’ll have to stack them on the floor since the disassembled book-shelves will go up where book boxes form three deep piles, three boxes high.

No more silence, at least not down here in the living room where I’m writing on my laptop. The boiler behind me gurgles, pops, clanks softly and water courses softly through the pipes, a hum. Even so, the overall effect is one of quiet, a top of the mountain, far from the city and its light pollution, quiet.

Winter                                                                          Settling Moon

Spent an hour at Colorado Toyota Services having our Blizzaks installed. The waiting is basic, a coffee pot, stack of magazines and four chairs. While there I read a book about the daily rituals of creative people. Fascinating reading. A name, then a couple of pages about their working routines, then another name.

Over at the King Sooper the line at the pharmacy was long, unusual for a Friday morning, but not for the day after New Year’s. At the Wings Wagon I discovered a local spot that doesn’t interest me much, then went on to the hardware store. Trash compactor bags.

Drove back up Shadow Mountain Drive disappointed that the warmer temperatures today had melted the snow. Gotta give those Blizzaks a work out.

The scratch and dent washer and dryer are in their places, on pedestals, ready now for laundry. The house has all its appliances, perhaps not in their final configuration, but we’re set in the utility room, the laundry room and the kitchen.

There is, yes, still more unpacking to be done. But this after that.

The soft acts of becoming settled. Drove out today and Eduardo and Holly were in their driveway, clearing it. I waved, they waved back, cheerily. Putting on the Blizzaks. Getting my drugs at a new pharmacy. Seeing the mountains all around me as I drive home. These are homely acts, acts which in themselves create a sense of being at home.