I Think It’s Time to Move

For those of you who were unaware, it’s been, well, cold of late. And snowy. Now I’ve been through cold weather before but never like this and its got me thinkin’…

A few days ago, after shoveling the driveway for the second time in four hours, I sat in my chair staring at a cheery fire and sweating profusely. My complexion was a light shade of Barney the Dinosaur purple instead of my usual healthy green.

Apparently, I was muttering quietly.

In my mind’s ear, I heard a familiar refrain, “Why don’t you get a sno-blower?” Oh, if I had a nickel for every time I’ve been asked that question! When asked, I thump my sagging, middle-aged chest and declare, “The day I can’t shovel my driveway, is the day I move to Florida! …Now where’s my inhaler?”

Growing up in Michigan I am used to snow and lots of it. Ya see, that’s why Michigan families have children: to mow lawns and shovel snow. When I moved to Chicago, I looked down my nose at the locals who complained about how awful Chicago winters could be.

“Ppptttthh!” said I, “You Nancy-Marys know nothin’ ‘bout hard winters! Why I used to shovel four feet of snow every morning before school, and again at night when I got home! Uphill both ways, in a 50 below windchill!”

Now that I’m a bit older, I’m feeling less secure in my Midwestern hardiness.

Today, we had a heat-wave—it was almost 20 degrees! I decided to go out and move all the snow that the City of Naperville so considerately pushed into the bottom of my driveway. As I huffed and puffed, feeling superior to all the sno-blower jockeys with their noisy machines, God sent me a sign.

There I was, moving with rhythmical sweeps of arms, legs, and shovel, a perfectly choreographed dance of man and his tool (?). I had become as one with the shovel, fluidly cutting through my frozen medium with ease, sending it in powdery clouds up and away never to impede my ingress or egress again! I was the master of my environment! Raising my mittened thumb to my nose, I offered a ribald salute to Mother Nature!

The snow had no answer to my onslaught. I began to imagine myself as a kind of apocalyptic hero, selflessly freeing my neighbors from their snowbound homes when their nasty little machines had failed to start. Lost in my reverie, I took a long, sweeping bite of snow. Lifting the shovel toward the side of the driveway, I watched in fascination as both the snow and the head of my shovel sailed away in a graceful arc, eventually falling into the drift beyond with a heavy *clump*

I stood there, shovel handle sans blade, still clutched in my hands like a demented pole-vaulter. Looking around to make sure I was unobserved, I waded through the drift to retrieve the other half of what had come to be my manhood. Jamming it back on the end of the handle, I contented myself with scraping the little dusting of snow that had accumulated on the sidewalk since I had begun my crusade.

Chastened and defeated, I hung the shovel on its accustomed hook in the garage. I watched it suspiciously for a moment to make sure the head would not fall off again and then retreated to the safety of my chair where I write this sad account.

It’s hard watching your youth rush away from you. Discovering you can no longer do the things you used to do is a kind of death. Like my snow shovel, I seem to have broken in two. Oh well, such is life.

All I can say is, I hope it doesn’t snow anymore this year, cuz next year I’ll be living in Florida where all I have to worry about is the odd hurricane now and then.