My feet are cold. I am wearing my trusty rubber boots because we got another big drippy rain today here in Ojai. However, I am now in my office, where there is heat and no rain. Why the cold feet?

We all know that lack of good circulation is probably the answer. I have, after all, been sitting in the office for several hours now, not out jumping in puddles and having a fun rain day like I used to when I was a kid. Of course, those days were usually in spring or summer when the temperatures were moderate to downright warm, so no cold feet then. I suspect that the old blood will start circulating as soon as I finish this blog post and pack up to head home. My feet will no doubt be nice and warm in short order.

In short order? So much of my language usage these days offers a window into my distant past. I can imagine my mother saying something like, “Len, I expect you to have your homework done in short order; we have to hurry to the church potluck supper.” There’s no way that sentence wouldn’t place me in a time and space at a specific time in American history (aka 1950s/60s), but I suppose it could be earlier. A quick perusal of the phrase’s etymology states that “in short order” was in use in American English by 1897, from the adverbial expression in short order “rapidly, with no fuss. So, the truth is that Mom’s admonition to hurry up could have been uttered by any number of American Christian women and men as early as 1897 to speed up their dawdling children who were late in finishing their schoolwork. But what about the cold feet?

I think I need to start walking more routinely. Sitting for hours as I work on Zoom is the major contributor to these frigid tootsies, and that could be a warning sign that my blood is dawdling a bit like the childhood me with my homework.

I can just hear my mother looking down from above and say, “Get moving in short order.”

“Yes, ma’am,” is my reply. Nobody wants cold feet.