People talk incessantly about weather. I can’t claim to be different. Give me half a reason and I’ll start in on the minutiae of weather, be it rains of Seattle, humidity of Houston, Syracuse’s preposterous winters, Binghamton’s prominent cloud cover, or New York’s seasonal weather. The obvious reason people talk about weather is that everyone can relate to it. In small talk terms (and I forget the psychological terminology for it), it’s a way to get the conversation started. It’s common ground where people feel comfortable. Once you start talking about weather, you can use it as a jumping board to other topics of interest that are—arguably—more interesting, such as, “This is bad, but you should have been in NYC back in the '80s.” “You too? I know, I was there, wasn’t it awful,” and off to a conversation the lucky fools go.

But there’s another reason people speak about weather. When you’re stuck in severe weather, the weather itself becomes a visceral feeling, something that you have to share, like a terrible toothache, a massive headache, or a natural disaster. Today was a perfect example. Doolies and I spent some (thankfully not a lot) of today walking the streets of NYC in brutally frigid conditions. The snow hasn’t arrived yet, but it should be here tonight or tomorrow morning. The cold before the storm has been terrible. Walking the last few blocks to return to the hotel from the apartment of Doolies’s sister was a truly dreadful experience. My ears felt as if they were preparing to drop off, each stitch that held them close to my head unwound in silent protest, followed by my cheeks and feet, and just about every other part of me that did not contain at least four layers of clothing between air and skin. I haven’t lived in NYC in about five years, and in that time, my skin has thinned. When I move back here, it’s going to take me a few years to get used to these ridiculous winters.

I’m sure I’ll have more weather complaints tomorrow, when the snow starts, and I’m preparing to damn the weather gods if my flight is delayed. Damned, I tell you. Damned!

We took a redeye to Newark airport last night and arrived at around six this morning. The flight wasn’t terrible, and I managed to sleep a few hours on the airplane before waking up. I woke up to the sounds of the engines seemingly turning off. I flung the window shade open and tried to figure out what was going on. I studied the lights below, trying to ascertain whether they were getting larger, which would indicate a descent, and possibly an uncontrolled descent. I also tried to determine which direction the nose of the plane was pointing. All signs were bad. My fears ended abruptly, however, when the captain spoke into the intercom to indicate our descent. It’s strange how you study the tiny movements and sounds of an airplane when you’re on it trying to find signs of trouble, even though if there were trouble, you probably wouldn’t know it until it was too late.

Before leaving, my mother called to let me know she was picking us up at the airport in the morning. That’s how my mother does things: she tells you she’s doing them. Because I am who I am, I told her no. I told her we would go to our NYC hotel by taxi and sleep for a bit, and I would see her on Saturday and Sunday. She reminded me that the hotel wouldn’t check us in until later in the afternoon, and we could rest in Brooklyn until then. This sounds like a reasonable suggestion now, especially when I look back at what happened, but at the time, it sounded like mothering, and if I even smell a tinge of mothering, I dive headfirst in the opposite direction. Our flight arrived on time, and as I planned, we jumped into a taxi for the hotel. Seventy dollars later, we arrived at the hotel. We tried to check in, but they told us that check-in time wasn’t until 4pm. We asked if we could get in earlier, and the lady at the front desk said, “I’m not sure when because we were sold out last night, but I should have a room ready between now (it was 7am) and 4pm. Write down your cell number, and I’ll give you a call as soon as a room is ready.” Doolies and I sighed, but went to find breakfast, braving the cold morning and finding a nearby bagel shop. When we returned, our room still wasn’t ready, so we lounged in the hotel restaurant and had a second breakfast.

When we couldn’t stand the modern décor of the restaurant any longer, we braved the lobby, and still the front-desk lady had no idea when a room would be ready. Since we arrived, we had seen at least ten people check out. We thought, surely they’d fix up one of those rooms and we’d have a room shortly. We decided to wait them out. We took up our seats in front of the gas fireplace (they didn’t pretend that it was a real fireplace, which I respected, having a naked flame dancing along a sandy bottom behind a glass wall), and braving the constant influx of cold air as the bellman opened the door for arriving and departing guests. After sitting there another hour, a new front-desk lady told us that they found a room and that someone was cleaning it; it would be another twenty to twenty-five minutes. We agreed because the thought of sleeping was too strong for us to do anything else. And face it: I knew we were powerless here. I whispered to Doolies that I could clean the room in five minutes and we’d be sleeping in six minutes.

Forty-five minutes later, with Doolies lying like a hobo on my lap in the lobby, our room was ready. This was more than two hours after we arrived. The moral of this story: had I accepted my mother’s ride, I would have saved $70 and sleep would have found us much earlier. Oh well. I guess the never-return-to-the-empty-nest-syndrome runs strong in me.