reflection

It's 19 degrees outside.

I'm not complaining, and I'm not trying to keep up with the Joneses or whatever because the entire country has looked like this all week:We actually haven't gotten any snow in Utar, but it sure is chilly. It doesn't help when you (I) live in a basement apartment and the central heating is controlled by upstairs and your (my) vents aren't great anyway so it's typically about 58 degrees inside your (my) house.

I haven't really gotten ready for the day at all this week. Too cold, especially when I have to be at work by 8AM. I'm a wuss. I get it. But truly, it's more worth it to me to wear a sweatshirt and have 2-day old hair rather than suffer those 5 minutes post-shower, when your systems is shocked from blissful sauna hot tub water joy and your skin is all squishy and your lungs are all full and clear when you cross the protective shower curtain barrier and hit a wall of FREEZING SHRIVELED SKIN ICICLE HAIR WHIMPERING JAMES TAYLOR'S FROZEN MAN COLD. Give me a dirty-haired ponytail any day. EVERY day.

Also I've fallen into the habit of not wearing makeup, really. I don't forget, exactly, and it's not even that I'm just lazy. It's more like, I think about it on my way into the office and think I'll just take a few minutes to put on some mascara once I have a minute and then all of a sudden it's 5pm and I'm looking at myself in the mirror wondering how I managed to look so hashed the entire day long.

Isn't it interesting how getting up early is so much easier in the summertime? Curse my bed with flannel sheets and my own personal body warmer (aka Ames, who seems to consistently and conveniently radiate heat at all times), which is always the most comfortable between 6:00-7:45AM. All beds are the most comfortable during those winter hours. It's like a big mattress conspiracy.

But 19 degrees is a whole lot more bearable than 5 degrees at 8AM, which is what it was yesterday. 19 degrees is real cold, but when I ran outside just now to take the trash to the dumpster, I breathed in a certain invigoration that kind of filled me up inside and felt inspiring, reminding me that I can work 8-9 hours a day and then live through the French Revolution every night and find stage dirt in the most unlikely places and things are gonna be A-OK.