Discontent, Disruption, and Disease

Discontent (n.) – the state or feeling of mental dissatisfaction, uneasiness of mind. From dis- “opposite of” + content.

Disruption (n.) – a break or interruption in the normal course. From the Latin disrumpere, dis- “apart” + rumpere “to break.”

Disease (n.) – a condition of the body or of one of its parts that impairs normal functioning. From Old French desaise “discomfort, misfortune; disease, sickness,” from des- “without” + aise “ease.”

Three “dis” words that describe my life so far in January of 2024. But not in an overwhelming way, just a hovering mood, a sort of gray funk. The kind of atmosphere that comes when bad weather, bad health, and the Post Holiday Blahs combine against me.

With the holidays behind us and spring long weeks away, the sameness of the season usually settles in now. I like sameness – to a point. I live by my routines, a form of self-discipline that gives me a sense of stability. I wake up at the same time every day. My early mornings follow the same pattern of bathing and dressing, checking my email, the news, the weather. Every morning Stacey and I sit and read a chapter in the Book of Mormon together. Every afternoon I do the chores at 3:00. Each evening I read a while before I go to bed. It is the same pattern every day. There are variations, but they are usually predictable in their variety. I tell myself that I like things this way. And yet, sometimes I long for a bit of disruption.

And that’s what I got last week. There was no sameness. All my routines were wrecked. The nasty bug I came down with right after New Year’s lingered on into last week. It disrupted my usual sleep. After rough nights of coughing and wheezing, I sometimes slept till 7:30 in the morning, which threw those days out of whack. Because I didn’t go to church last Sunday, my whole week seemed muddled. I’m still not completely recovered. As always happens with me when I get sick, it has turned into a cough that will go on for weeks. But I’m doing better than I was. That’s good.

Then to really throw things off, Stacey and Miriam left on Tuesday. They were going to leave at 10:00 a.m., but we were in the middle of a winter storm with snow and high winds blowing. They ended up waiting until after dinner when the snow had changed to rain. Even so, they were nervous driving in the slush. Once they were a little south and away from the highlands, the roads were better and they made it to the Thayn’s house without incident. Stacey flew out of Pittsburgh on Wednesday to visit our nephew Jake’s family in Texas. Tabor, Rachel, and Russell also flew to Texas to attend a business meeting. Miriam is at their house taking care of the girls.

So Hannah and I were the only ones home after that. As always happens when Stacey is gone, I don’t sleep properly. I toss and turn. Every little noise wakes me up – the furnace coming on, these ancient walls and floors clicking and popping as the house settles, snow sliding off the roof, the wind in the trees. That, combined with my coughing, had me feeling pretty wrung out. On the days when I’m not in school, and sometimes when I am, I’m used to having Miriam’s company and I missed her. It was nice having Hannah home in the evenings after she got home from work, but during the day, I felt a bit lonely. And dinner every evening was what you might call light fare. Neither Hannah nor I wanted to make much of anything. I made a big pan of yakisoba and we ate it by bits over several days. Hannah made one pizza for us on Friday that lasted into Saturday. We are not ambitious when it comes to making our own meals. Things just are not complete when Stacey and Miriam are away. So it was a week spent in disruption, but not the sort I wanted. I wanted to escape to something different, but not that.

The beaver pond.

More so than ever these past few years, winter stirs discontent in me. It starts after the new year and builds in intensity through the interminable months of January and February and on into March. I’ve long daydreamed of being in warmer, sunnier places during those hard weeks, but never hoped to actually go away. Then in 2019, we went to Italy, and in 2020 and 2021, we went to Florida. Once daydreams are fed a dose of reality, they become a different animal. Now as I pine through the long weeks, the cold seems harsher, the days darker, winter seems crueler because I’ve escaped it a few times – and I liked it. Instead of being home and alone most of the time last week, what I really wanted was a vacation somewhere different like the Bahamas, maybe. Or, better yet, Tahiti. Not Gold (as much as I love it), and alone, and winter throwing snow and ice at me.

Italy in 2019.

Miriam and me on the beach in Florida, 2020.

Hannah, Miriam, and me on the beach in Florida, 2021.

The storm that delayed the departure of Stacey and Miriam on Tuesday was the same one that roared across the east causing all sorts of mayhem. Here it only brought us snow, and then rain that turned the snow in to heavy slush, and then wind. The wind roared all day on Wednesday. It brought down a lot of branches from our old maple trees. It snowed again on Thursday, but not much.

Lots of branches blown down.

“Now is the winter of our discontent” is the opening line of Shakespeare’s Richard III., the same play that gave us “A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!” (Richard III, Act 5, scene 4). I know the play and I know somewhat of the actual history of Richard III, the last Plantagenet king of England. History, for the most part, has treated him unfairly. Shakespeare, in a brilliant propaganda piece, portrays him as an evil, conniving hunchback, a usurper who murdered his two young nephews in order to claim the throne. But Shakespeare was writing during the reign of the Tudors who needed Richard to be all of that to justify their own usurpation of the throne. Anyway, after reading some of the more recent and less biased examinations of Richard and his short two-year reign, I have more sympathy for him. I bring this up because, when working with the idea of winter and discontent while writing this, I looked up that quote and discovered that John Steinbeck wrote a novel titled The Winter of Our Discontent. It was his last novel, published in 1961. I thought I’d read all of Steinbeck, but somehow I missed that one. I ordered a copy from the library and added it to my winter reading list. I love discovering things like that.

Richard III, Olivier playing Richard III, and John Steinbeck.

On Friday we had a pretty sunrise – the first of the year as the weather has been mostly overcast. It was, however, an omen of bad weather coming, another winter storm. After school, I hurried and did my weekly errands before the storm was due to arrive. My errands were the usual – a trash run and a trip to Runnings to buy chicken feed. When I walked into Runnings, I was shocked to see a huge display of seeds and growing supplies right in the front of the store. It seemed like a cruel joke to make me walk through all of that when planting time – indoors or out — is weeks and weeks away. I was tempted to buy some seeds, which I suppose is why they were there, but I didn’t. I didn’t even stop to look. I went straight to the back of the store, loaded my cart with feed, and hightailed it out of there.

Sunrise on Friday.

The seed aisle at Runnings.

That storm was a pretty big one. The weather map showed its impressive size. When it did arrive on Friday night, it lashed us with wind, rain, snow, and sleet. At one point we looked out and it seemed like the world was wrapped in fog, but it was a blizzard of powdery snow. It was so dense we couldn’t see the barn from the house. Then, after dumping four inches of snow on us, it rained, which made the rain-heavy snow slide off the roof. All night long the sound of it thudding as it hit ground kept waking me up. Saturday morning when I went out, it was 35° and raining. The township plows had been by and, although they did an excellent job of moving snow off the road, they blocked our driveway with a bank of snow about the weight and consistency of cold, soggy oatmeal. Kurt was nice and plowed us out with his tractor. Later that day, the sky cleared for an hour, but the temperature began to drop and then the snow returned. By nightfall we were at 16° and everything was frozen solid. Tonight we are supposed drop into single digits and maybe below zero.

After the plows went by.

Friday's weather map.

When Hannah and I left for church this morning, it was like a blizzard outside. The snow was thick and the wind was high. Driving to Wellsville was precarious. The roads between Gold and Genesee were a mess with snow and white outs. New York state wasn’t much better. If Stacey had been here, we would not have gone. But we made it to the chapel. Only eighteen people showed up, but our meetings were good. The drive home wasn’t as bad. The sun was trying to shine and the plows had been busy. We’re almost ready to eat lunch. Then I’ll have to go out to do the chores. Other than that, I don’t plan to go anywhere or do anything. Maybe a long nap.

So Miriam is still at the Thayn’s house and Stacey is still in Texas. Stacey and Rachel and Tabor are trying to fly back tomorrow, but the weather in Texas isn’t good either and their flight was canceled, so they are trying to find another. Church down in the Thayn’s ward in Greensburg was canceled because of low temperatures and high wind, so Miriam didn’t have to take the girls to church. Miriam and Stacey were hoping to drive home tomorrow, but at this point, we don’t know when that will happen.

Tahiti.

In Papeete, Tahiti, it is 81°. The cheapest roundtrip ticket there is $1,300. We could fly there and just stay on a beach and eat coconuts and pineapples and mangos. They grow wild there, don’t they? Ah, no. It cannot be. I guess I’ll just put on another layer of clothes and continue to be discontent.