Madame Bovary and Winter

It's winter, which means I ride my bike significantly less than I would like to. I miss the fall when I could dress like this:

and truly be warm enough. Now I need a heavier coat, some tights under my jeans, a scarf, thicker mittens, and a big ol' hat. I do still bike to Wistariahurst every week since it's so close, and they say "I can't believe you rode your bike! It's freezing out!" But then I think about people in Canada and Denmark biking in snowstorms and much colder weather than here so I feel guilty if I don't brave the cold at least sometimes. I will admit that it's way too cold to ride the 18 miles to work. Plus, with the short days the sun is right in drivers' faces when I leave work so I wouldn't want to risk getting hit by a car. Even a bike-aware driver can't see you if the sun is in his face.
But I will long for days like the one above. I saw this girl locking up outside the Dam Cafe while I was working inside. Fabulous red fall coat and I was happy to see a fellow biker. Here's what my table looked like:

For Christmas I got a new basket for my bike as well as a new light, so I'll have to set those up on a warmer day. I'll post pictures soon. I'm very excited to be able to haul slightly more groceries now!

You would think that with winter here and me holed up inside more often, I would be reading a TON. Nope, I have instead been spending a significant portion of my time playing Scribblenauts and the Professor Layton games on my Nintendo DS. However, last night I finally finished reading Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert. I wasn't sure I would like it at first since I didn't like Madame Bovary herself (and the last time I didn't like the main characters - in Lady Chatterly's Lover - I hated the book and it took a lot of work to get through it) but I ended up enjoying it.

It's actually a wonderful comment on "the grass is greener" viewpoints and the influence that novels can have on us. Emma Bovary is so miserable in her life because she thinks that all love must be like the love in novels and that fine things will make her happy. She is just so deluded that when she is confronted with reality it completely unravels her. This is the kind of book I wish I had read in college so I could discuss it with other book-lovers with the guidance and insight of a professor.

And I think even now people can be influenced like that by novels. If I expected love to be like novels I would probably be disappointed with what I have with Dave because it's not a constant torrent of passion and heightened emotion. Most of the time we are simply content together, but I'm a realist and I like it that way.