I’ve
whined and sniveled enough in this column about my detestation of the winter
months here in good old Sas-katch-ee-wan. Then again, you don’t live on the
Canadian Prairies for the number of years, (58), that I have and not find a way
to cope or even kind of enjoy the winter conditions…given the proper activity,
of course, and the proper clothing, too.
I’ve
come to the conclusion that it’s the total inconvenience of winter that I
really can’t stand; not the actual weather, per se. Cold temperatures or stormy
conditions can be somewhat enjoyable, too, if you’re in a cozy house with a
warm fire, a hot beverage and a good hockey game or two to watch. However, that
said, freezing one’s digits off while clamping the booster cables to the
battery posts is a different story altogether.
Take
the difference between July and January. On a typically July Saturday morning you
get up and throw on a tee shirt, shorts and some flip-flops, hop on the bike or
stroll on down to the post office for the mail and come back and sit on the
patio reading the weekly paper while sipping on your coffee. Easy peasy.
On a typical January
Saturday you get up and throw one, three or six layers of clothing on, put the
touque on over your earmuffs, pull on the snow boots and mitts over your
gloves, put up the parka hood and start to shovel your way to the car, all the
while hoping you remembered to plug in the block heater the night before and
pray that the stupid thing will even start, and, if it does, then you brush off
the snow and scrape off the ice and shovel a path out of the driveway and hope
that the snow removal crews have been out so you can get down the street crossing
your fingers that you won’t slide through the intersection and hit something,
or someone, and then when you get to the post office and get out of the car you’re
hoping that you don’t slip and fall on the ice and break a hip or crack your
noggin or some damn thing…see what I mean? By the time you get back home from
getting the paper you’re too exhausted to read it, never mind pouring a coffee!
Sheesh!
Then again, as
stated earlier, given the right winter conditions and the proper cold weather
clothing you can enjoy some winter activities like I just did over the past
weekend. The weather was unseasonably mild for this time of year with less than
the usual gale-force wind and the sun was shining so I threw on the snow shoes
and tromped around the golf course for a little while.
The gale-force
winds that we had been experiencing recently had sculpted the snow into odd
looking drifts adding a rather surreal, otherworldly look to the landscape. The
drifts had the look of whitecap waves on a lake that had been instantly frozen.
The only sounds out there were the crunching of the snow shoes and the huffing
of my breath. There’s nothing like a close touch with nature to help you feel
alive.
Then, the next
day Deb and I took our five-year-old grandson and three-year-old granddaughter
out to the toboggan hill in their hometown of Wolseley and slid down the hill a
number of times on the super-sliders. All of us. What a blast! Treyton and I
even did a little skating on the outdoor rink that they have there, too. It’s
at those particular moments when winter is most appreciated. Still
inconvenient…but appreciated.
“Winter is not a
season, it’s an occupation.”-Sinclair Lewis. (1885-1951).
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