Walking out into the corn field that was harvested two days ago, the corn stubble was cold and frosty in the early morning sun. I walked a few hundred feet into the field, turned back towards Pinehaven, and took this shot. You can barely make out the house for the trees.It was a cold morning (30 degrees) and with enough frost to delicately etch the low sun into the grass and the roof. We still have not turned on the second floor heat so it was in the low 60's when I crawled into bed last night. I had two blankets, one turned back double on itself, and still was not warm enough at first. I've decided it is the energy I must expend to warm the bed before I can get comfortable. If I lie there a while and then turn over, the warmed spot is comfortable. Then, throughout the night I am plenty warm ... unless I push a blanket off.
But getting up is another matter! I hurry on with a robe, rush breakfast (the heat pump keeps the first floor at 64) and then climb the stairs to my bathroom where I quickly turn on a space heater. If I wait while the room warms - brush my teeth long before I even think of a shower - all is well. I can't even think of doing anything that would require getting wet before the tiny room has warmed.
And yet we are wimps! What of this house a hundred years ago when there were only two stoves to warm the whole of the place and not an electrical outlet in sight? What about the outhouse in the back yard? I should consider how lucky I am to be under a roof.
