Brrr! Brrr! Brrr! Dig out the polar fleece, throw another log on the fire and put more marshmallows in the hot chocolate … winter has arrived on the Palouse. It’s cold! Bone chilling kinda cold. Lose all the feeling in your fingers and toes kinda cold. Put your winter pack in the trunk of your car – just in case kinda cold. Yeah, it’s cold.
This recent plunge in temperature feels like déjà vu all over again for my dear husband and me. As we breathe in the single digits on the Palouse, we’re transported back via the polar express to Minnesota, our home before we moved to the Pacific Northwest. Cold? Yeah sure, you betcha! And it lasted for at least seven months of the year. Every year. No respite, no breather, no calling uncle. Winter came. Winter stayed and stayed and stayed and stayed.
Not surprisingly, we each found our own ways of making the most of our below zero environment with acres of snow that graced the landscape. My better half loved to winter camp and cook over an open fire. I loved to camp out in front of the fireplace with a bowl of popcorn. He loved to ice fish and then savor his catch. I loved to throw ingredients together and concoct the perfect warm, hearty soup. He loved to snowshoe mile after mile. I loved to sit hour after hour and watch it snow while snug inside our warm little cottage. Cold, warm. Yin, Yang. You get the idea.
Thankfully, despite our unique approaches to enjoying winter, the one activity we always agreed on was our “winter stash”. It required no special equipment or clothing. No secret ingredients or unique set up. It only required our library cards. Yes, they were what got us through the two hundred plus days of every brutal Minnesota winter. We used our cards frequently to accumulate our “winter stash” of books that we stacked and piled and read and read and read. Our living room, bedroom and den looked like the aisles of a delightfully enchanting and well used bookstore. Here a book, there a book, everywhere a book, book! From mysteries to biographies, from gardening to cookbooks, from travel guides to historical fiction, we were mitten-deep in books, books, books just waiting to be savored as the snow fell and fell and fell outside our windows.
And thankfully in life, some things don’t change even when location does. Five years ago we moved fifteen hundred miles to the west only to find ourselves once again in the throes of snow and single digits. So, yes, we’re once again mitten-deep in our “winter stash”. Our library cards are getting used frequently as we go to the shelves and take home title after title after title.
So if you’re like us and want to accumulate your own winter stash, I know just the place and people who can help you. Put on your coat, hat, mittens, scarf and warm boots. Grab a big empty bag or two (or three or four) and head to Neill Public Library. Bring your library card and as my grandma would say, “have at it”. (And if you don’t have a card, no worries – you can get one for free in about 2 minutes!). Peruse the shelves and check out all the books you want. Throw in a DVD or two and maybe a few magazines as well. Then, head home, settle in and enjoy. Repeat this process often. Ahhh! I can’t guarantee spring will actually arrive any sooner, but I can assure you that winter will feel a bit more welcome, a little more bearable and maybe, even down right enjoyable. From all of us at Neill Public Library - Happy Winter! Happy Reading!
By Kathleen
Children's Librarian
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