snow days in MN

I want to remember what it feels like to move, to get the heart pumping and the limbs swinging. After a long summer making a living as a landscaper, creating walls out of forty pound rocks, shoveling yard after cubic yard of aromatic bark mulch, my week or two of relaxation has distilled into boredom. I look outside and it’s snowing, something that would have moved me when I was ten. Where has that feeling gone? I grab my coat and boots and head out the door. Gotta get out of here. Outside, that’s the only reality, not this inside craziness. Stuffed up like a sardine, staring at screens. No, that’s not for me, bucko.
It’s somewhat chilly, but my high tech Patagonia coat is pretty much all I ever need down to twenty degrees or so. I’m a human furnace; I heat up easily with any amount of exertion. So soon I’m sweating, but its okay. A little sweat never hurt anybody, right? When the wind whips up under my shirt, it’s cold.
Half way around our loop, a three and a half mile circle around a wide part of the Mississippi, from Franklin down to Lake and back up. Usually east to west side.
Damn, the wind is biting my cheeks off. Should have grabbed a face mask.
Beauty mixed with breathing and exertion, car exhaust and irritation at my unstable footing. But I get there, slowly around.
So there it is, the warmth of an apartment after a winter excursion. That’s what I’m looking for, that’s the magic after the magic. Now I want to walk around Lake Superior, a polar explorer. I need to get out of the city, into the wild! But I settle back, eat some of the leftover refried beans from breakfast and hatch my plans in the comfort of home.