Confirming the fact that Small Town Folks are Hardier than us Suburbanites
Have you ever visited the small township of Minden before? It’s a growing summer cottage destination and just over 6,000 people call the place home. I honestly think that smaller Ontario towns breeds hardier, resilient, and somehow warmer-bodied people. How so? Well let me just demonstrate with a quick comparison between our situation vs what we overhead over breakfast:
Exhibit A: Suburbanites Struggling with Cool Weather
If you’ve read our cabin night stay in Minden, you’ll probably know that Angelo and I struggled to stay asleep the entire night because we were too cold.
When the sun finally rose, we were faced with a different dilemma. To continue shivering in bed or to start our shivering outside with Limone potty duties?
Now, on a normal day, I’m the one on morning duty. That day? Angelo felt my shivering worm of a body beside him, and as the more considerate and noble partner between the two of us, took one for the team and volunteered himself for this morning’s duty.
You should heard my sorry attempt to ‘protest’:
“Ohhh noo… let me do it…”
*proceeds to bury herself deeper into the covers*
“It’s my turn…”
*rolls into the deepest recess of the bed*
In the end, while Angelo headed out with a happy Limone to confront the morning 2-degree frosted grounds, I continued to groan and shiver under the bed covers for another half an hour before crawling my way out towards the space heater in the opposite room.
Thanks to my snail-paced morning, it took us another hour to pack up, load our car, before we drove our way towards the local diner for some much-needed piping hot breakfast.
Exhibit B: A Minden Local and Her Flip Flop Friend
One of my favourite things about visiting local diners is seeing how the relationships between the employees and their diners unfold. Oftentimes, the folks have developed friendships, or are family relatives. Their pleasantries are always sweet, and thoughtful — with many diners stopping by and asking about the employees and their family’s wellbeing. Here’s one of the conversations we overhead as one of the regulars proceeded to pay for his bill:
Diner: “Oh, and can I get this pie to go as well too? You know how my wife loves your pies”
Employee: “Oh yes of course! Not a problem!”
Diner: “So… are you ready for the white stuff? It’s starting to get a bit cold out here!”
Employee: *laughs* “Not yet! It’s certainly getting colder now, and I’m just grateful it isn’t wet! I should start getting ready for the snow though. Ah! I need to tell my mother to dress more warmly. You know how she is, I keep telling her to wear some socks now, but she’s still going about with her bare feet this morning!”
Diner: “Oh — definitely time to put some socks on at least! How’s your friend, Melissa doing by the way?”
Employee: “Oh she’s doing great! You know the other day I was chatting with her and she just came in with her flip-flops. In this weather! Can you believe it?”
… Did you feel the chill in your toes after hearing this conversation? Because I certainly did! I needed to take a sip of my freshly brewed cup of tea to drive off the cold after hearing this exchange. Bare feet in 0 degrees, flip flops in sub 5 degrees… my entire body is just shivering!
Now I’m curious! When do you normally start swapping your flip flops and sandals for boots? Was it in September? Maybe October? Will it be in November? Let me know!
