Throughout the night, it howled and moaned and roared like a great lumbering beast in its death throws.
It rattled the windows, whistling through all available cracks, clattering the porch furniture and creating a veritable symphony among the wind chimes.
Suddenly, mid-morning it stopped dead, as if for a moment of silence.
Then it took off once more, raging through the tormented trees that began to look exhausted. “We’ve no more leaves to give!”
If they had, they’d have been in Montreal hours ago.
WHAT A WIND.
This one is on the inside, my “bird decals”. As I applied them, I wondered if perhaps they should be outside, though this wind might have even peeled them off.
I’d like to point out that my windows are not dirty. They are weathered.
Poor old Tom Turkey will be having it rough today, if he’s ventured out.
He’s been coming around lately in the afternoon and in my melancholy mood I of course thought: “poor Tom. He’s all alone.“
We were coming back from Greenwich yesterday and passed a house that we pass almost every time we go out. But yesterday :
“That house looks so lonely.”
I’ve had the thought before. Never actually voiced it.
Grant hesitated then said “well a place can exude a vibe.” Or something like that. Good answer, but I wasn’t thinking of vibes. I was thinking: “square, rigid, boxed off, out on its own..bit like me really.”
Melancholy is a step up from depressed.
I think.
Here’s another melancholy thought:
“There’s Tom, he’s leaving. Going away.”
It’s amazing what a spin you can put on anything, according to the mood you’re in.
Banks didn’t come off well yesterday.
Hah. My opinion of them doesn’t change even when I’m mellow!
Wind, of course, can get people agitated. Everyone loves a cool breeze. I don’t even mind a bracing gale. But when it blows for hours without stop and bashes everything about:
It was enervating, disturbing and it brought up old memories.
A howling wind reminds me always of hurtling freight trains. As I listened to groaning trees, I remembered the trains I used to hear rushing away through the night, in the distance, long ago. I lay in my warm bed, in the house where I used to stay, when I was on my way to and from Heathrow for some family visit. And I would hear the old clock on the mantelpiece downstairs that struck every half-hour and solemnly tolled out the hours of the night.
Till the day I die, I’ll remember those sounds. To me they were the sounds of safety and warmth. While in that house, there was nothing I needed to fear. No-one would shout at me, or accuse me, or ask of me something I could not give.
There was always a smiling face, a delightful meal and laughter at some of my stories. My well-being was cared for.
If I could have called a place home, that is where I would like it to have been.
A couple of nights was all I ever spent there, coming or going, but of all the places in my past, it is the one I shall always feel. Some old memories are sweet.
The people who lived in that house are long gone. She was my mother’s cousin, though I called her my aunt. They were the owners of the first cat I ever knew, Michelle. It had come to them during the war, after being bombed out.
.
There are lots of named winds. Here are 9 of the most famous:
Khamsin : Egypt
Chinook : Canada
Cape Doctor : South Africa
Santa Ana : California
Harmattan : West Africa
Mistral : France
Sirocco : North Africa
Fremantle Doctor : Western Australia
Pampero : Argentina/Uruguay
There is something exotic in the names of winds, don’t you think?
I love the decals and it doesn’t matter which side of the glass they are on. Hopefully, they convince the birds that it isn’t an empty space that can be flown through. I agree that strong relentless winds can give you a restless feeling. My Mother always was a nervous wreck during a prolonged windstorm and my first dog, who had no issues with thunder or lightning was terrified of a howling wind. The only time in her life, she ever wandered across the street was during a March wind, as I recall.