Pbenjay's Blog

We thought it was a good idea, well at least one of us did and the other went along with the plan.  He might say it was out of love, however I suspect he weighed the facts and fears and decided it better to acquiesce rather than risk 72 hours of harangue.

It had been weeks since we were at our cottage on the Jersey shore and I always get a little anxious about leaving my little La Vie En Rose to fend for itself against the winter elements.  Of course I am reminded by someone who shall not be named that I can’t protect it.  I, on the other hand see merit in checking on it and turning the heat up and of course putting out peanuts, corn and birdseed for our dependents.  I don’t know where or how they eat when we’re not around  but apparently they do.

So I had it in my mind to go this weekend because I wanted to grocery shop, pick up some prescriptions, check on the house and bring back the bins that the Christmas decorations go in.   All sounded extremely logical to me.  But then I had a real estate appointment that ran a little late AND I got the brilliant idea that we might pack up all the decorations into shopping bags and that way it would be a one way trip and not back and forth.  We would leave in the morning.

As we began packing up the reindeer, the bows, the ornaments, penguins and angels, Peter thought we should listen to the weather report.  It was SCARY!  I knew as the minutes ticked by that there was no way that boy was leaving in the morning after a possible 6″ snowfall.  Bad enough we were parked in the ideal spot, right in front of the building.  So I convinced him that we should leave NOW – finish up the packing, grab the cats and go.  We did just that!!

Ever so quickly we threw the decorations into multiple shopping bags, took the milk/orange juice/cat food essentials we needed to make it through the night and possibly the next day and hustled into the car.  We’re just about to pull away when my phone rings and that reminds Peter that he does not have his phone!  Back upstairs.

We think we’re going to beat the storm but ha, ha, ha….hubris!  The storm gods were waiting for us just as we passed the Newark airport.  No nice big soft flakes coming down that usually herald the beginning of a heavy snowfall – NO we are hit square in the face with driving snow smacking the windshield and virtually creating a white-out! I’m a nervous passenger when Peter is driving so right about now, I’m on high alert!  While I’m watching the road and trying to keep track of the white lines which have disappeared, I’m also texting my sister-in-law, Juanita who is still in Florida and standing under a star-lit sky.  AND she’s now praying for our safe arrival!

As we cautiously proceeded and others flew past us recklessly, I had serious doubts about my insistence to go and was feeling guiltier by the minute.  Thankfully as we got closer to the shore, it actually lightened up a bit and the next hurdle would be parking the car.  Turns out that our side of Broadway is the legal side to park during a snow emergency, so I figured everybody on the north side of the road would already be parked on our side and I could envision trekking over snow banks to carry the cats into the cottage in the dark.  

Luck be the lady!  The spot in front of our house was empty so we pulled right in.  I rushed in to turn the heat up, the lights on and start the unpacking process.  It was good to be back in our little cottage, I turned the candles on (in the windows) and went to the shed to gather the shovels and move them close to the back door.  I also dug out the ice melt and wondered just how bad it was going to get.  The snow just kept falling and falling.  

I like being in my cottage during a snow storm, somehow it doesn’t hold the same charm for my city-born-and-bred-apartment-dwelling husband.  I’m sure he was thinking of the snow shoveling that would have to be done, me too!  Since we didn’t really have any food here, we called in an order to the local Italian restaurant and Pete went to pick it up. I called Juanita and told her we were safe and sound albeit a bit chilled.

Dinner and a movie and before we knew it, it was really late and we tucked ourselves in upstairs with an extra quilt (so country-like).  However, there was a movie on TV that caught our attention and it wasn’t lights out till 3:30am!  At about 2:00am I went downstairs to look at the backyard which now had drifts going this way and that!  Hello Hercules!

Hercules