Weekends

A little fog, a little sun. We’ve entered the late autumn cycle. Interspersed with bouts of wind and rain and bitter cold, we have clear blue afternoons that begin to fade by 3 p.m. into dusk, colors leaching from the sky and all of the buildings.

We are in a season of extremes — brilliant bright sun against the dramatic backdrop of a pewter-gray sky. This is a city of extremes – this is the time of year where we find ourselves chuckling at the clothes we wear — holding on to our right to wear cardigans instead of coats, and nice shoes instead of waterproofed boots. The funniest thing is to see girls at the University defiantly striding out in Daisy Duke-style cut-offs, legs bare to the elements except for a thin layer of fishnet or lacy stocking. They tremor when they walk, so caught up in shivering.

While there is darkness and wind, there’s also a feeling of impending celebration. Between the early November Diwali celebration to Fireworks Night and the upcoming Christmas revels, the streets these days are filled — cars, traffic, people on foot heading for the city center, and the “maul,” as D. calls it (borrowing from author Terry Pratchett). While we struggle through the days, trying to simply get up as the early dusk and late dawn seem to rob us of coherent wakefulness, we wonder how the people who live here all of their lives fare. Are the numerous lights downtown working for them? Do the sodium-yellow streetlights actually make them feel like things have color? We are so glad that this is our last winter, and a little alarmed that it’s not really even begun yet, and we’re already to the point of dread.

— Dread, but functional dread, fortunately. We are dragging ourselves out of bed and to the gym with grim determination. We are not going to become sick this year, or give in to the sapping urge to hibernate at eat our own baking until we fall over in a stupor. (Although that sounds really fun at this point…) We plan to make it through our last winter with our sanity intact!

Every little thing helps, in that quest for sanity. Though T. tends to become more of a Hobbit than usual when it is dark and cold, D. managed to drag her out of the house this weekend. Having read the fine print in our chorus manual, T. realized she would be prohibited from wearing boots for our concert on the 20th. Since the tops of the boots won’t be visible under her regulation black pants, she couldn’t see what the problem was, but since D. needed some new things for work anyway, she was talked into going downtown. T. continued her quest to own shoes that are “so ugly they’re cute,” and bought what D. could only describe as organ shoes. D. picked some thicker trousers for work, having come home soaked to skin on Friday and not really excited about repeating that freezing experience. Fortunately, the wind drove us home and the rain didn’t start until we were climbing the last hill to the house. Loathe as we were to leave the house, it was actually invigorating being out and fighting the elements. It’s just hard to get out there.

While Glasgow’s not an expensive city, per se, it’s easy to spend too much if you indulge a whim for going out. We don’t often visit pubs or coffee shops anymore, having dispensed with coffee and the drams for which one visits the pub. We don’t even eat out much, simply because it’s often disappointing. There are hundreds of well-respected restaurants in Glasgow, but there aren’t a ton of vegetarian options that are included in a menu except as an afterthought, and honestly, there’s only so much eggplant or so many huge grilled Portabellos one can eat without figuring out that one could have stayed home. (Plus, when the real urge you have is for a burrito, well… the portabellos don’t really do it for you.) Occasionally, however, we go out — and this time visited the newish pub across the block from our house. We were excited, because The Drake had a fire in the little iron grate that was just being lit when we walked in.

We should have taken pictures, because it was a coal and peat fire — not that either one is all that exciting, but a.) we Yanks don’t really know what it looks like, and b.) the coal was smokeless and looked like black dinosaur eggs. (And yes, we can say that because we all know exactly what dinosaur eggs look like.) Peat is, of course, processed, decayed moss and stuff that’s ages and ages old, and it’s dug out of bogs and wetlands with special shovels and then set aside to dry and be burned. There’s a lot of discussion on the ecological issues in burning peat, but people burn it because it burns hot for a long time. This peat, rather than being hand-dug and in plain blackened brick slabs, was in a nifty shape with initials pressed into it, the coal used was supposed to be smokeless (although the proprietor winked and said he had some of “the good stuff” in back), and the smoke didn’t particularly want to go up the chimney. All in all, it was a strange but good breakfast.

It’s now 20 minutes to 4 p.m. and the sun is going down. We’re wishing for a peat fire of our own.

-D & T