Ups and downs

The colds from which the Kickass Canada Girl and I have of late been suffering are quite the most loathsome that I can recall. I am still struggling to shake off the residuum – in the shape of a vicious dry cough – nearly two and a half weeks after first succumbing to this pernicious pestilence. The Girl is following on roughly a week behind me and an entire month will thus have passed by the time that we have both fully shaken off this scourge.

Neither of us has felt throughout this period like doing anything much more than hunkering down and waiting for the storm to pass. This last weekend however – although it is still only mid-February and the mornings are yet frosty – there was a distinct intimation of the imminence of spring in the air. Closer attention to the world outside revealed that the first green shoots had started to poke their sleepy heads through the permafrost. Lambent spring colours may thus shortly bring relief to our saturnine winter gardens.

Once back in the land of the living it will be high time to make a point of getting together with old friends, some of whom we seem not to have seen for ages. I suppose that this negligence could be considered an ineluctable side effect of the customary brouhaha of Christmas and the dark days that follow, but that does rather feel like excusing the inexcusable.

The joyous sensation that the thought of such engagements engenders is – however – tinged at the same time with sadness… not at the prospect of rekindling old friendships, but on the recognition that other such occurrences will not be possible in the near future. Over the past few years the Girl and I have become rather accustomed to making frequent trips to British Columbia. In 2010 our wedding and the arrangements therefore prompted several trips to the province, including one extended visit for the event itself. 2011 – through a combination of circumstances both happy and sad – saw another brace of visits and, of course, once the Girl moved back to Victoria last spring I became – as regular readers will know – a regular myself on the transatlantic route.

All of which led us to becoming somewhat spoiled with regard to the access that we had to our dear and lovely friends in Victoria and Saanichton. One of the consequences of our recent decision regarding my 60th birthday celebration next January is that we will not now be able to revisit Canada until next Christmas. For me that will mean a gap of a year and a half – and more – without my setting foot in BC…

…and I miss the place – and I miss our friends…

Sniff!