Winter sighs and slips away

Only two weeks ago, temperatures came above freezing for the first time:

Warm-weather foods began showing up at the stores, too! I made my first guac and pico of the year!

The overflow on the creek crossing got wider and wider. Miss Thistle, ever a leader, is so great about navigating through the safe spots! (Note: This creek is very shallow, so the risk is not drowning nor even getting wet. The risk is slipping on the ice and banging up my knees!)

When we get to the narrow spur to our house, Cricket always yields the lead to her. Such well-trained girls I have!

And then just last weekend, the weather turned... to a Winter-is-over temperature:

I gave up skijoring, unhooked the girls, and skied freely with them running beside me. The snow is too fast to be pulled by dogs at these temperatures! The overflow was now impassible on skis. I took off my skis and walked across along the side, through the remaining soft snow in the woods.

Happy girls!

Not all of us are sad at the end of winter. Cricket loves sunbathing!

Thistle is less excited about warm weather, but she does enjoy her couch time, too. Boy, she sure is soft and fluffy. I'd sure love to squeeze her more often, but Her Royal Highness Does not Care to be Squozen.

Cricket, on the other hand, always loves a good squeeze. :)

That last cold day of winter?

Temps have climbed up to nearly thawing this week. They are due to drop again next week, but in March it's just not gonna get that cold any more, or if it does, it will warm up during the daytimes. The sun is powerful enough to have a real impact now. As always, I feel a bit melancholy. March is my favorite month, but I feel sad that it's so short. Here is a photo from our last cold morning, and my last dose of frosty eyelashes! Two weeks ago now:

As usual, Cricket is waiting for me on the porch while Thistle is wandering around sniffing things. And there is our tiny cabin. Most Fairbanks grad students give up their tiny dry cabin when they graduate and get a "real job", but this cabin is hard for me to let go of because it has felt like home from the minute I stepped in. And I will never forget that lovely young couple, smiling with their orange marmalade cat, their dog who looked and acted just like my Autumn, and their adorable toddler who reach up her arms immediately for me to hold her. I was leaving a long-term relationship, and this little cabin just felt like home.

Almost every woman I know of approximately my vintage (came of age in the 80's-90's) has a memory from our past that makes us cringe: when we made ourselves smaller and erased our own needs and desires so as not to inconvenience an unworthy man. Then one day we woke up--seemingly abruptly to those poor bastards--and walked away, leaving their mouths hanging open. For me, it was when I bought this cabin, packed up my stuff, loaded up the dogs, and left.*

That is why this cabin has always felt like home to me. It was my refuge (and of course the awesome trail access didn't hurt!) I knew DL was a keeper when he realized how much this place meant to me, and moved out of his conventional home with a flushy toilet and everything, to move here with me.

If God would offer me the opportunity to give any lasting lesson in the world to my young students, it would have nothing to do with engineering. It would be this: You are Good. You Are Worthy. You Are Enough. Do Not place any part of yourself behind the needs of a person who would not do the same for you.

*And you know what they tell their friends and family? "She up and left me out of the blue! For no reason! We had a perfect relationship!" Meaning, of course, that it was perfect for them as long as we never asked for anything, and bent over backwards to please them, and we were never an inconvenience.