Frozen in time

I'm posting this as quick as I can because: a) we've been viewing another possible school for younger daughter today and b) Google denied me access to my blog earlier because it thought I was spyware or something. I did my "mommy" approach to computer glitches; I switched the damned thing off at the source and started all over again. ("If you can't play nicely, we'll forget the whole thing.) That has seemed to work for the nonce, but I'm posting before Google gets cranky again. After all, I only have three days of posts to do; it would be a shame to stumble at the finish line.

A couple of days ago, I was talking about how I was introduced to the music of Dar Williams through my Launchcast station which is still playing for me here in Canada. As this shortest-but-still-the-damn-longest month draws to a close, my mind has been very much on her song "February". It's not my favourite of her songs (that would be "It Happens Every Day" or "When I Was A Boy"), but the sentiments of the song go with the Ottawa weather of this time of year which rolls from frozen moonscape wastes to dirty, agar-like slush and back again.

I found a rather nice video on YouTube set to the song, but it's very rural (as is the song, I guess), so I'll follow up with some rather more urban snaps I took early in the month and yesterday on Ash Wednesday:
I threw your keys in the water, I looked back,
They'd frozen halfway down in the ice.
They froze up so quickly, the keys and their owners,
Even after the anger, it all turned silent, and
The everyday turned solitary,
So we came to February.

First we forgot where we'd planted those bulbs last year,
Then we forgot that we'd planted at all,
Then we forgot what plants are altogether,
and I blamed you for my freezing and forgetting and
The nights were long and cold and scary,
Can we live through February?

You know I think Christmas was a long red glare,
Shot up like a warning, we gave presents without cards,
And then the snow,
And then the snow came, we were always out shoveling,
And we'd drop to sleep exhausted,
Then we'd wake up, and it's snowing.

And February was so long that it lasted into March
And found us walking a path alone together.
You stopped and pointed and you said, "That's a crocus,"
And I said, "What's a crocus?" and you said, "It's a flower,"
I tried to remember, but I said, "What's a flower?"
You said, "I still love you."

The leaves were turning as we drove to the hardware store,
My new lover made me keys to the house,
And when we got home, well we just started chopping wood,
Because you never know how next year will be,
And we'll gather all our arms can carry,
I have lost to February.

It takes a lot of love to survive February, and I suspect that that particular love didn't because her new lover has made her keys for the house. That's my challenge for today; not losing to February. Oh well, it will be over soon. And then it will be the horror that is March in Ottawa. Sigh....