By G. E.
Shuman
Most people
who enjoy winter in the North have a few things in common. They either love
outdoor sports, like skiing, snowboarding, and snow machining, or they are into
making snowmen, snow angels, and other strange snow things. They love awaiting
the first snowfall, which normally hits our area before we get our pumpkins
carved, and they get excited by that ‘winter wonderland’ feeling of a snowy
Christmas. Well, I don’t do or feel much of that. I used to, but not anymore.
I am pretty
sure that aging is directly proportional to a lack of tolerance of cold
weather. Either that or I’m just getting cranky in my elder years. I guess
that’s why God makes snow birds and sends them off to Florida every winter.
I always ‘look
forward’ (joking) to my first winter preparation ‘ritual’ which usually has
something to do with fixing the snowblower and checking to see if it is gassed
up and actually starts. (The only thing I dislike more than snow blowing is
shoveling when there is no gas in the blower. I almost never let that happen.) Getting
the thing ready for the first blizzard is just so satisfying. Sure.
I also have an
exciting time, usually sometime in January, trying to unscrew the garden hose
from the house after there is already ice in it. (I don’t have a garden… just a
hose. I’m terrible at growing things.) I am reminded that I didn’t disconnect
that hose when I notice it, still attached to the house, while driving into the
yard. This is always on the coldest and windiest day of that month. I then go
inside, remove my boots, go to the cellar, find the correct wrench, or one that
will possibly work, go back up the cellar stairs, put my boots back on and go
back outside to undo the hose. I then drag the stiff thing down into the cellar,
again. It all seems so familiar. Now I’ll just have to see, again, in the
spring, if the hose split and if I will get to buy a nice new one. Yea!
Another
thing I love about winter is that I don’t have to mow the lawn. Having a
ridiculously small lawn, I shouldn’t complain about taking care of it, but I
do, anyway. It is always a joy to me when the lawn finally gives up the ghost
sometime in August and just stops growing. I don’t water it with my new yearly
garden hose, (I wonder if it will be a bright green one this year.) The hose is
mostly just out there so that I can disconnect it when it’s really cold out. I also
do, in the summer, wash the cars out there. I also would NEVER buy lawn food.
That would not help my feeble lawn grow much, and even if it did help, that
wouldn’t help. A nice snow-covered lawn
is smooth, and some people think, pretty. In any case, the snow covers that
grass very uniformly and builds up as the frigid days linger. The difference
between it and grass is, mostly, that it will get rid of itself after it gets
to be a certain height. Sun doesn’t help it grow; it helps it go away, which is
good. So, that’s another good thing about winter.
I also get
to stay home more in the winter, and I don’t mind that at all. There’s nothing
like hunkering down on a cold winter’s night and listening to the furnace run.
Eventually
the snow will go, and I will head to the hardware store, peruse the seed
display and outdoor tools, (for someone else’s garden,) and pick out my new
garden hose. I wonder what color it will be this year. Like I said, I don’t have a garden, just a
hose. I’m terrible at growing things.
