Rose Simpson: Weather complaints, the circle of the Canadian life

_ Rose Simpson’s column appears every Tuesday morning on the OttawaStart Blog. She also blogs at Rose’s Cantina . You can read her previous columns here . _

Photo: “Hauling Winter Away” by Zhu, from the OttawaStart Flickr Group

I was thinking of Geoffrey Chaucer as I bundled up against the wintry cold the other day, cursing the droghte of March which had perced me to the roote, wishing for April with its shoures soote.

Yeah, that Geoff could really turn a phrase.

I’m sick of winter. This is the winter I remember from my farm days when I walked two miles to school in boots that made my feet cry. It’s not global warming; it’s a harkening back to the olden days when winter in Canada made poets weep on pages not yet paid for by the Canada Council.

Give me global warming anytime, sister. I’m a woman, I’ll take it. I’m not afraid of hurricanes and tornadoes. I live in Ottawa. I fear no backlash from the climate. I’m a middle-dweller.

This week, I saw the first sign of spring as I bundled up and headed from my nice and toasty Suzuki into the gymnasty. It wasn’t a Robin. There aren’t any birds around except the crows that are laying waste to our garbage, sitting as it is for two long weeks courtesy of the City of Ottawa’s environmental protection program.

What I saw in the tree was a miracle. A pair of yoga pants draping the leafless-branches of a tree.

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I wondered how the pantaloons got there. Were they orphaned by some luckless yogini who had finally given up on the activity that turns sensible women into pretzels?

Was the yogini giving up or did she simply discard her pants as a gift to the Gods of spring? Is she now prancing about the gymnasty in shorts and a tank top? If so, she’ll feel the Mighty Wind travelling up her Pikachu.

This morning, I woke to my turn my clock forward, another rite of Spring, only to discover the temperature was -14 and threatening to stay that way for the rest of the week.

I curse the polar vortex. I long for the gales of spring, and the end to the pockmarked streets and the start of construction. I don’t want to live in a CBC drama any longer, with the Wind at my Back. I want warmth, a high humidex, smog even.

I say that, of course. Until the sun can bake an egg on Bank Street.

Then I’ll be complaining about how hot it is, like most Canadians picking up their double doubles at Tim Horton’s.

Typical.

The circle of the Canadian life.

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Rose Simpson _

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** See also: ** Ottawa Weather Guide

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