Yesterday while I was on the way to Regenstein Library, a little flock of birds twittering around a little tree caught my attention. With a few exceptions, they were American robins, fluttering on and off the tree’s tiny branches and trying to hop around in the several inches of snow that remained after last week’s storms.

I thought about how seldom I see robins flock, even in this modest way.

And how magical that one of the first signs of spring would appear unexpectedly among the cold, wet vestiges of a harsh winter. In early February.

I hope they have enough to eat to keep warm.

Yesterday it was about 50 degrees F when I left home in the morning, about 35 degrees when I left work in the afternoon, about 12 degrees when I went to bed, and about -1 degree when I woke up this morning.

There’s nothing like a tangible weather front, one that can be seen on more than just a weather map, one that can be seen coming, one that can be felt by all the senses.

There was the day I was at the lake, watching lightning of a storm further south. I noticed the black clouds moving toward me and stayed to watch the front advance. I felt the temperature drop and swear I could sense a change in pressure. Fascinated, I watched the line of the downpour as it advanced past 57th Street beach (where everyone ran screaming) until suddenly I was behind it, soaked.

Last night when I got off the bus I didn’t feel especially cold, but flakes of snow were starting to appear in the lights. In front of The Park Shore, I noticed that my hands felt cold and achy, and the wind picked up in moment. The storm predicted had begun.

I might have had the wrong key out for the back gate because at first it wouldn’t open. I couldn’t see with my hair blowing in my face and my eyes watering, and my fingers were now between achy and numb. Under my coat, sweater, and heavy shirt, I started to shiver with cold and wind. If necessary, I could always go around to the front door, but it would take longer, and I wanted to get inside as quickly as possible.

Then, while struggling with the lock, I experienced a very brief panic — a sensation that I had to get out of the elements now, or else. At that moment, the gate opened. For the rest of the evening, wind gusts occasionally shook the building and snow obscured the night, but I was warm.

When Sir Edmund Hillary died, I read the obituaries, then I skimmed some articles about an English climber who, depending on the version of the story you believe, was left to die or was left for dead by other Everest climbers. The writers described the conditions on Everest, but how can anyone convey what has to be experienced to be understood?

Reading about what extreme cold, high winds, and lack of oxygen can do to the human body reminded me that there are those who thrive on danger because with it comes excitement, glory, or notoriety, or all three. I am not one of them; I will never climb Everest. While I may not be the adventurous type, however, I am an imaginative one, and underlying these moments of panic are flashes of imagination and empathy, some sense of what it is like to experience uncertainty about pain and suffering, about life and death. It’s not rational; I had no real fear of freezing to death by The Flamingo’s back gate. For a second or two, though, I was pure animal, unsure and afraid of the future.

And very, very cold.

Yesterday I knew it was going to be a glorious weekend when the first thing I did Saturday morning, after a night of restless, troubled, broken sleep, was to break an irreplaceable tea dish.

Last night, while I was cutting open packages of goat cheese for a cheese-and-crackers orgy, I also cut a good-sized divot in my left ring fingertip–using children’s safety scissors. Who knew they would be so effective? On the plus side, I’d just bought antibiotic bandages. Perhaps I knew . . .

In between incidents, J. was kind enough to come over and drive me to Whole Foods. He was excited about getting the “softball-sized” diver scallops he’d reluctantly passed on last week.

I said, jokingly, “Wouldn’t it be funny if Whole Foods didn’t have any left?” He laughed.

Guess what? They were sold out of diver scallops.

I joked about it in the car. J., who’d also been disappointed that a café he had wanted to go to had been closed due to earlier winter hours, said, “Maybe you’re a witch.”

Not likely, because if I were I could find far more productive use for power than to deprive J. of a few diver scallops.

I have a high threshold for pain, I’m told by those who should know — health care providers whose job involves causing pain, e.g., sliding long, cold, pointy metal implements up a nostril.

So when a tooth started to object to hot and cold liquids and foods shortly after my dental examination and cleaning last week, I was inclined to ignore it. After all, tooth pain often comes and goes for no discernible reason. Only once did the pain not subside, forcing me to break down, see the dentist, and find out that I needed a root canal (said the endodontist’s assistant after the procedure, “Weren’t you in agony? There was blood and infection everywhere under there.”).

This time, however, I waited only a few days instead of a few months, even though the pain was intermittent and not that bad. Why? Because my overactive imagination started to feel millions if not billions of bacteria pouring into the vulnerable spot, setting up housekeeping, and eroding the structure away until the nerve was exposed. When I ate or drank anything, I could feel the resident bacteria inviting in more friends, saying, “Welcome! Bienvenue! There’s plenty to go around!”

To quell the greedy, destructive masses, and my imagination, I made an appointment with the dentist.

The dental assistant poked, prodded, and even pounded around my upper left molars, where I thought the problem was, then took x-rays. The moment I bit down in preparation, I realized the unhappy spot was not in the back, but in the middle. The dentist, who sees all from her office via computer, directed the second set of x-rays at #14 and #15; a shadow turned up. After she took her turn poking around, she came to the conclusion that it would be prudent to replace both old silver fillings. Prudent — and painful. And costly.

An hour later, she was almost done, telling me that now I have more filling than natural tooth in that area. She wanted to test my bite with the new fillings, but apparently I was too quick to snap. “Not yet; that’s my finger,” she admonished, although when I apologized she said that there was no harm done; she’s gotten “pretty quick” herself.

A few minutes later, her hand got tangled up in my hair. “Hmmm, you bit my finger; I pulled your hair,” she said. “So now we’re even,” I noted. She laughed nervously.

Of course, the last laugh was hers (in her office) when the office manager presented me with my portion of the bill.

Ouch. Perhaps I’m more sensitive to pain than I thought.

Note: Don’t get the wrong idea. I have a great dentist, worth every painful dollar.