The View and the Light

October used to be the month to winterize the single-pane windows with sheeting or insulation, but this November has been so deliciously mild that I dawdled. October ended; still not cold enough to insulate. One by one the flannels came out of storage: pajamas, sheets, robes. Then the wool socks and the fleece vest. But still we haven't had a hard freeze and that's when I block the windows, the view, and the light, so as to keep the indoors a bit warmer. During real winter the cabin's logs are cold as a witch's boot all the way through and the walls radiate cold that gnaws the bones.

So I don't usually get a view in November from the bedroom window: a quilt of trees, foliage and red berries. I love watching the moon sail by at night. I chose blue sheets so I can pretend I'm floating in the sky. The pillows are pink because it was either that or white. I've used satin pillowcases for decades. Unlike cotton, satin pillowcases don't pull on your face and hair and leave it all matted and striped in the morning. This was taken before I made the bed. I must make the bed every day. If I don't I feel as if chaos might engulf me.

Two Men This Morning

GPS found for me the nearest building-supply store, boarded up and closed now after a windstorm, and then GPS took me to a Lowe's it didn't know was now a Gander Mountain store, and after that took me on a circuitous and time-consuming trip to the next-nearest Lowe's, far out of my way, and I sighed because I'd had other plans for the morning. But I wanted a single sheet of foam-board insulation to cut up for covering one more window plus the glass front of the non-working fireplace. At last I got the board--9 feet by 5 feet. It wouldn't fit  in my car and I'd known that so I had my box cutter and tape measure and the  measurements, and asked the Lowe's checker if there was a place in the store I could lay it down and cut the pieces. (Outside were high winds and occasional snowflakes.)

To my amazement the checker--his nametag said "Rein"--measured and cut the boards himself, perfectly, in five minutes, and I was so grateful I snapped his photo to show you.

Then I had to get the boards -- 6 feet by 3.5, and a smaller one--into the Corolla. Smaller piece, fine. Larger one wouldn't fit in the  trunk or back seat, nohow; always six inches too long. For 15 minutes I kept pulling it out of the car trying different angles, wrestling it as it acted like a sail in the gusty winds. I was about to razor 12 inches off the long side and try to repair it later when a man came up to me and said, "I see you're struggling with that. I will put it in my truck and follow you home with it." I wanted to accept his offer, but GPS had brought me so far from home that my area was far out of his way.

So we both worked on fitting the board into the car, bending it as much as 3/4" foam board can bend, at one point accidentally breaking off a corner of it, until I said, "It's no use. I will just have to make a a cut." But then he adjusted the board and suddenly it fit and didn't obscure the entire rear window either. I didn't take his picture, but you know he was kind. Maybe an angel.

GPS in its wisdom had known all along it was taking me to the only place where two different people would help me.