Today was just gorgeous here. I watched the national news and they talked all about the absolute freezing temperatures across the country. Just brutal. But it was beautiful and sunny here in our world.

David took half the day off and we went on a 16-mile bike ride over into another city suburb, and spent a couple of hours at a park. It was heaven. My kids pedalled their little legs off and my tailbone is still sore, but we were all proud of our long ride.

But now I'm back in the bowels of hell and trying hard to remember to embrace the entropy because the panic is starting to rise inside me.

My laundry has not been started and my washing machine isn't working, (of course!) my house is filthy, and I have New Beginnings on Wednesday night. It's hard to know where to start...can I ignore it all until Thursday morning? I'm going to need some dark glasses and some air freshener.

While we were out at the park David reminded me that he proposed on Martin Luther King Day, 13 years ago...(He was very against proposing on a major holiday so, in an effort to nudge him along, Kelly and Amy made him a list of all the minor holidays from the end of December until the end of March. He chose this one over Groundhog Day and the U.K. Banking Holiday. I still have their note.) I congratulated him on the anniversary of the day he made the best decision of his life.

We hiked up to Delicate Arch (our place) and David proposed under it...it looked remarkably like this picture with snow on the mountains behind it...

Life has not turned out the way I thought it would. I don't even have the ring he gave me that day any more. (It was stolen when our house was broken into a couple of years ago.) But given the choice, I would say "yes" again, a thousand times over. (I'm not sure he would ask again, even on a minor holiday, but nevertheless...) We've logged a lot of miles together since that day, and sometimes I'm not sure we are really making any progress, but there is no one I'd rather be riding with.