I Choose...Warmth

I returned from the city late last night to one very cold cabin and two very happy-to-see-me cats. I got the woodstove cranking and turned on an electric heater in the bedroom upstairs. It took a while, but the chill began to fall away and the cats began to purr. I had to set the alarm for a middle of the night re-loading of the woodstove. We got a small stove for the cabin when we bought the place six years ago. It won't hold hot coals overnight, meaning that you have to restart it in the morning with paper and kindling, unless you get up and keep the fire going in the middle of the night. It's not so bad...if you're just visiting. Living here is a different story of course.

The woodstove in the new house is a marvel. It's big and made of soapstone, polished to a sheen on the outside. Here is a picture of "The Mansfield" from the Hearthstone website:

Soapstone has different colors in it, similar to marble or quartz. Ours is mostly green with white and cream and black variations. The stove in the picture has a shiny brown frame, but we chose a matte black metal. The marvelous thing about soapstone is that it radiates heat for 24 hours after the fire goes out. The box of our new stove holds about three times what the little stove in the cabin holds, so no need for middle of the night stokings. And the fire really looks like that through the window--large and lovely with a slow, smooth flickering. The cats are going to love it.

We also have a few strategically placed electric baseboard heaters in the new house so that we can leave the place for several days if need be in the wintertime without freezing the pipes and/or cats. It is a nice set-up.

I bragged to my son, Jack, that I had an apartment in my college days that was so cold in the wintertime that I actually saw my breath for about a week during a particularly brutal cold snap. I asked him the other day if he had turned on his heat yet. "No way! I'm not doing it until I see my breath." I hadn't meant to throw down a gauntlet, but apparently that's what I did. Well, he can tough it out all he wants. I'm going to stay nice and cozy, thank you. Me and the Mansfield--best friends forever!