A Day for Staying Indoors

MONDAY

Today was one of those days when the weather made all the decisions. I woke up just after 7:00 am and pulled back the curtains to reveal a thick layer of snow still clinging to the ground.

I had planned on heading out for a medical appointment in Holmfirth, Huddersfield but the idea of travelling 95 miles across the Pennines  looked a bit of a challenge. Checking the Highways Agency cameras, I saw that the M62 was down to a single lane in places, and locally the A55 wasn’t much better, especially east of Rhuallt Hill. However, Google Maps, ever the optimist, estimated a journey time of 2 hours and 50 minutes (just 50 minutes longer than normal).

As I considered braving the journey, the decision was made for me when, at 8:00 am,  I received a text from practice to say that they would be closed for the day due to the weather. 

It wasn't just my appointment that was affected. The T2000 community group, which was supposed to meet at the village pub this evening, also called it off due to the snow and ice. The pub is only a 300-metre walk from my house.

So, it was a day for staying indoors, keeping warm and ordering a few things online rather than going to the shops.

As a child,  my Dad always planted hyacinths every year - it  marked the seasons of my childhood. He’d plant them in bowls and in a glass vases suspended over water, carefully marking the bottom of the bowls with the expected flower colours. He would keep them in the dark of the cellar, and somehow, always ensured they were in full bloom on Christmas Day. 

This year, my attempt at continuing the tradition was less than perfect. The hyacinths are 12 days late, as I left them outdoors in the shed for far too long. The colours didn’t come out quite right either—I had grand plans to coordinate the hues, but that didn’t quite work out. 

They remind me of my Dad and of those Christmases past when, as a child, everything seemed just a little bit more magical.