Ice Melt

When I left for work today, my yard was snow filled.  The roads were icy and the day had every indication that it was going to be yet another cold blustery day.

At work, I barely got up from my desk, I have a ton of work that needs to get done before the end of the month, so I basically ate lunch while working and got up only when I had too.  I was pretty surprised when I went outside and it was much warmer than it had been in the morning.

Fast forward to this evening when I picked up Bri and Leslie from Preschool.  The snow was gone.  It took me driving several miles out of town, on the way to my house to notice,  but all the sudden I noticed that the roads were dry and clear, that the snow had mysteriously melted, and driving down the interstate towards home showed no signs of the 9 inches of snow we were deluged with this weekend.  So between chorus's of "Puff the Magic Dragon" and "Superkalifragilisticexpaldocious", we admired the scenery on the way home.

When I finally got home, my yard was completely snow free and it was 54 on my car thermometer.  I'm so happy.  I love the snow, but I'm tired of it.  I've had it.  I want it to warm up.  I know I keep moaning about this, but this winter has seemed endless to me.  Much more than the previous winters have been.

I know, everyone is probably saying..."well dummy, you DID move to Montana, what did you expect?"

I don't know what I expected, except that I wanted to raise my kids somewhere besides California.  Don't get me wrong, I love California.  I never expected that I would ever move away from it.  Then I had Brian.  Living in Alameda, which is very nice was great.  It's an island off of Oakland.  Anyway, all the sudden, I wanted something simpler, cleaner, and slower paced to raise my son.  When we were finally able to leave, I had just found out I was pregnant with Leslie.

I don't regret it a bit.  I now own a house, with an acre of land, sitting up on a hill over looking the valley.  I can see the forest all around me, and I counted 18 deer in and around my yard tonight.  I could have never in a million years, given this to my kids in CA, at least in places I would want to live.  I certainly could have never bought them a house, let alone a house like this in the Bay Area.  There was no way I was going back down to So Cal again, can't stand So Cal.  So that left the greater Bay Area and north.  The Central valley was out as well, more because of the horrible heat in the summer than anything else.  Rick really wanted to move to Montana, so here we are.

So forgive me for griping.  I do love it here.  I finally feel like I've landed where I'm going to stay for the rest of my life.  I never felt like that living in the city, since I always knew, in the back of my head, that I would never be there permanently.  I am growing roots here.

Still this winter has been a challenge for me.

That being said, I still haven't heard anything from the gentleman who was supposed to send me my lottery winnings.

Comments

[Monica]

Oh yeah? Another transplant like myself. So Cal has never been my favorite place, even growing up there, I bolted north as soon as I graduated high school. The town I grew up in had a population of about 33,000 when I was in HS, now it's closer to 150,000. Pretty much a bedroom community to LA. I'm glad I'm here too. Are you up by Sand Point somewhere?

[Phil]

I grew up in So. Cal., and there's no way I could envision a life for myself there now. Life is too good up here in the rural northwest.