Digging Out From Under

I'm back in the blogosphere, after about a week's hiatus, due to the DC area's third snowfall in 150 years with over 20 inches of accumulation.

My son Paul and I went to Catonsville, south of Baltimore, to see Andre Thierry play some zydeco. He was over an hour late. The weather, the brake lines, something like that. Norm pulled his accordion out of the case, Jimmy got his big tenor voice ready, I played guitar, Paul played the harp, and the band's own drummer and bassist joined in, as we improvised a cajun fest, to keep the huddled masses dancing until the headline act arrived.

Saturday night found me at another dance, In Takoma Park just north of DC. My friend Therese called, saying the snow had already started up above Baltimore, and she couldn't get there. I muddled through somehow...

Morning found me looking from the window of a high-rise apartment in nearby Silver Spring. I was gazing down at a winter wonderland. My friend Ron put the coffee on, and we read the paper and mused about whether I should brave the elements and go home. We decided I should go for it, and except for a delay on the entrance ramp to the Beltway, when some youngster in a sports car got stuck with a pile between the ditches, I made it back without incident.

Monday was President's Day, and so it was a holiday. Tuesday they shut down the Government offices in the DC area. Wednesday I took the day off, to do the things I wanted to do Monday and Tuesday except that I was snowed in. This included seeing a movie. This picture called to mind the words of the great English Catholic writer Gilbert K Chesterton, in his epic poem, The Ballad of the White Horse:

"For the Great Gaels of Ireland
Are the men that God made mad,
For all their wars are merry
And all their songs are sad."

Now there's an Englishman with whom no self-respecting son of Erin could argue.

So now the next weekend approaches, along with the anticipation of that great Catholic holyday of "obligation" known as Mardi Gras. More on that revered institution next week. Until then... ALLONS DANCER!!!