Adventures in Paradise: It's all about perspective

Another week in paradise. I’m required to say that because I, like many of you, choose to live year-round in a place that has winter six months out of the year.
I certainly enjoy Wisconsin because it’s truly a land of opportunity. Shawano and Menominee counties are branding themselves as the place to go on wild adventures. With all the great year-round sports available in this area, it was probably a wise choice to highlight those.
Even though I do very few of those adventures, I’ll promote almost anything to get people to see this area and hopefully fall in love with it the way I did.
Sometimes it’s a little hard “following” friends on social media who are on perpetual vacations around the world now that they’ve retired, but I know several of them worked at jobs they didn’t like very much in order to go crazy with living life now. There is always a trade-off.
Although nothing in my life turned out the way I thought it would, it has been a very interesting ride. These days, my adventure can be found in theaters and concerts, which fortunately can be included in the wild side of life that this area offers.
I’m also getting a big kick out of reporting on other people’s adventures. Having the time to go interview people about their lives and businesses and hobbies is like a dream come true for me. When I get positive feedback from people, especially from those who have subscribed to the paper all their lives, I do a little happy dance. It’s not on the list of wild adventures, but it works for me and I’m keeping it.
There is something special about living in an area that changes seasons, sometimes violently, that gives you a sense of accomplishment. “Remember when we had 2 feet of snow in April?” becomes a badge of honor as the years go by, and we forget about how truly annoying and disrupting that fit of Mother Nature was to our plans.
When we first started the murder mystery dinner theater at the WOWSPACE, there was nothing else going on like it in the dead of winter. As we are busy preparing for the next show, I’ve noticed there are a lot more things going on at this time of year. I guess that’s proof that although some of us feel it’s a great plan to curl up with a good book during bad weather, there are plenty of things going on to entice us out of our cocoons.
While I enjoy having plenty to do in my corner of the world, I’m finding it harder to plan time away to spend with others in their neck of the woods. I had been hoping for a mini California vacation this winter now that my niece is in college there. I thought how fun it would be to bask in the West Coast sunshine.
For now that dream will be on hold. My niece is enjoying college life but is rethinking her time spent in that location; after all the winter has been gloomy. It’s all about perspective. For someone who grew up in tropical climates, a little cloud cover can seem to ruin a day. To someone like me, who grew up and still lives where temperatures can range from -20 to 95 F in the course of a few months, a little cloud cover sounds like paradise.

Miriam Nelson is the editor of the Wittenberg Enterprise & Birnamwood News.