Last winter was a harsh one. I hate being cold and, in extreme circumstances, am forced to abandon all thoughts of elegance and take avoidance action. My daughter, who lives close to the mountains in Switzerland, once gave me some wise advice: “It’s all about layers, Mum” she said. Last winter I discovered the truth of what she said, as I piled layer upon layer of clothing on my poor, shivering, ill-adapted body until I felt like the old blow-up ‘Michelin man’ who used to adorn delivery lorries for the Michelin rubber company. I re-discovered all about wearing leggings under jeans, piling on vests, T-shirts, sweaters, thermal gloves, snow boots and finally, my piece de résistance, my furry body-warmer. Everyone over the age of 40 needs one of these!
My mother had a gloriously shabby, sheepskin body-warmer which, increasingly, as she got older, she wore almost daily to keep her warm in the small of her back where she complained of feeling the cold. Later, in the nursing home, I grew accustomed to seeing her warmly dressed and tucked up in a blue tartan rug just to make sure and keep out draughts. My body-warmer is rather more fashionable, I like to think, but it does the same job admirably. I have a fine pair of sheepskin-lined slippers too, again reminiscent of what my mother wore in old age, but neatly shaped and threaded with a pretty, pink ribbon to make them a little more suitable to my time of life. My daughter bought them for me for Christmas and as I climbed out of my nice warm bath this morning and slid my feet into them I thought grateful thoughts in her direction and felt, yes, ‘snug as a bug in a rug’ as my old mum would have said.
So why a bug? And why wrapped up in a rug, apart from the obvious rhyming advantages? I try to imagine some shiny little black beetle snugly wrapped up in a blanket, but the blanket is too big and the beetle gets lost. Probably he would get lost in a rug too. I’m not keen on it when bugs get lost – they make me nervous and I like to keep track of them so they don’t disappear and end up climbing up my trouser leg or worse. My husband is well used to climbing on chairs armed with a cup and a piece of card to rescue me from some bug or spider which has crawled up the wall and onto the bedroom ceiling so I can’t rest easy, lying in bed in the dark, without first being rescued from the intruder.
My thoughts trundle on… why do bugs need to feel snug? Aren’t they cold-blooded or do they feel the cold like the rest of us. Perhaps they do, like the mice that find their way into our shed in the winter and end up cuddled up to the back of our freezer to keep warm. Again, not a comforting thought and another strange one because, of course, a freezer is not where you would expect to find a warm place for overwintering.
Still, so many of these sayings we know from childhood run off the tongue without us pausing for thought and then when we do we find it impossible to explain them or their origins. I may have to pursue this train of thought at a later date…
My mother had a gloriously shabby, sheepskin body-warmer which, increasingly, as she got older, she wore almost daily to keep her warm in the small of her back where she complained of feeling the cold. Later, in the nursing home, I grew accustomed to seeing her warmly dressed and tucked up in a blue tartan rug just to make sure and keep out draughts. My body-warmer is rather more fashionable, I like to think, but it does the same job admirably. I have a fine pair of sheepskin-lined slippers too, again reminiscent of what my mother wore in old age, but neatly shaped and threaded with a pretty, pink ribbon to make them a little more suitable to my time of life. My daughter bought them for me for Christmas and as I climbed out of my nice warm bath this morning and slid my feet into them I thought grateful thoughts in her direction and felt, yes, ‘snug as a bug in a rug’ as my old mum would have said.
So why a bug? And why wrapped up in a rug, apart from the obvious rhyming advantages? I try to imagine some shiny little black beetle snugly wrapped up in a blanket, but the blanket is too big and the beetle gets lost. Probably he would get lost in a rug too. I’m not keen on it when bugs get lost – they make me nervous and I like to keep track of them so they don’t disappear and end up climbing up my trouser leg or worse. My husband is well used to climbing on chairs armed with a cup and a piece of card to rescue me from some bug or spider which has crawled up the wall and onto the bedroom ceiling so I can’t rest easy, lying in bed in the dark, without first being rescued from the intruder.
My thoughts trundle on… why do bugs need to feel snug? Aren’t they cold-blooded or do they feel the cold like the rest of us. Perhaps they do, like the mice that find their way into our shed in the winter and end up cuddled up to the back of our freezer to keep warm. Again, not a comforting thought and another strange one because, of course, a freezer is not where you would expect to find a warm place for overwintering.
Still, so many of these sayings we know from childhood run off the tongue without us pausing for thought and then when we do we find it impossible to explain them or their origins. I may have to pursue this train of thought at a later date…
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