Let’s get one thing up front – the older I get, the more I question whether or not spending the rest of my days in the cold snow belt of Eastern Canada is what I want to do.  My body starts to seize in October, and usually doesn’t thaw until late April.  For those six months, I am constantly sore and cold, shoveling is a chore and travel is a pain.  Today just reinforced the point. I am not going to go quietly into winter!

This evening I write from a hotel is Bangor, Maine, watching a major nor’easter – think the movie The Perfect Storm with snow – blast outside the hotel window. I am on my way to Newport, Rhode Island where I am slated to work with their language teachers on Monday as part of staff development day. I was excited to be asked, and I am looking forward to spending the day in great conversations. The getting there part…well, it’s turning into a journey. I got up this morning and hit the road, hoping to beat the storm. If weather permitted, I would have driven all the way today, but no luck. I got as far as Bangor

Barbados Driftwood

where self-preservation forced me off the road. I have a flight booked to leave here tomorrow at noon. I just hope it leaves. I had hoped to be able to drive all the way today and not fly, but right now the sanest option is to fly.

It’s days like this that I am extremely jealous of my colleagues teaching in international schools in more temperate locales.  My wife and I have talked of taking a couple of years at some point and heading overseas to work internationally. This might encourage us to move even quicker.

Until then, guess I’ll have to settle with the knowledge that it’s only 56 days until we find our warmth. The only white I want to see will be the sand on the beach!