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And on the Eighth Day, He Created the Snowblower
O Wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
Unfortunately, Mr. Shelley, the answer to your question is an unambiguous “yes.”
There are two and only two things about winter that I like: the promise that it will end and my snowblower. While the former is the more profound comfort, I’m most thankful just now for the latter, as my hands and feet warm here in my office after two and a half hours out in the cold.
My mother passed away three weeks ago today — two days after Thanksgiving. I returned this week from a long visit to New Mexico, where I was caring for my father (who miraculously survived a severe heart attack a couple of months ago) as he recovered from his thus-far only bout with COVID. I arrived back in New York to retrieve Lucy, my* beloved dog, from the veterinary hospital where some peculiar and agonizing paralysis of her hindquarters placed her a few days before my return. She is curled up beside my desk now, enjoying industrial-strength painkillers and a rawhide chew.
The snow hit yesterday, a good foot and a half of it. It’s heavy and wet. I haven’t lost any trees on my own property (a bit of a surprise, given the number of fragile birch trees I have), but the power went out shortly after midnight and has only just been restored as I write this. I heat with oil and/or electricity, neither of which work when the trees and the lines do battle, so the place got pretty chilly. [Note to self: Get at least one of your two generators working, you dummy.]
One doesn’t need electricity to clear a 300-foot driveway and attached turning/parking area. One needs a snowblower or a plow. I have a snowblower (and thank you again, my sons, for that most thoughtful Father’s Day gift of a few years back). In fact, I can’t imagine that an electric snowblower is even remotely feasible — even if the power wasn’t out as mine was today. No, the snowblower is proof that fossil fuels are and will remain essential into the indefinite future. Essential to 60+ men with long driveways and grown sons. Essential to civilization itself.
(Pro Tip: If there is a reasonable chance that the snow now on the ground will last until spring**, be sure to clear a path a little wider — and certainly no narrower — than you will want available all winter long. Running a snowblower into a couple of feet of new snow is doable, so take the extra time now; you don’t want to try to carve more space out of a four- or five-foot-deep packed embankment sometime in January.)
My mother was a remarkable woman: intelligent, calm, generous, and somewhere on “the spectrum.” Old friends, the ones who went through nursing school with her way back when, observe that she was always a little different, smart but not entirely connected to the conversations going on around her. She was much in demand as an unflappable operating room nurse, called in at all hours for trauma cases and the occasional shooting. I don’t remember her once losing her temper; I don’t remember her once breaking down. I do remember her long philosophical and theological discussions with the many priests who visited our home while I was growing up. I’ve been blessed to have two rock-solid parents, my father an optimistic extrovert, my mother a halcyon introvert, both safe and peaceful constants in my childhood.
My father lost his sense of taste and smell a decade ago. No one knows why. Now, after years of dining at home as he cared for my mother, my father is exhibiting a surprising interest in food. He now divides his time between reading the news and watching cooking shows; as his mobility increases, he chooses new restaurants at which to eat. We ate out at least once a day while I was with him. He’s an old man unlearning old habits, and it’s nice to think that, for the first time in his life, he has a few years ahead during which he can indulge himself — something he’s never really done.
My mother was 85, and passed away in her sleep, at peace, surrounded by her children.
* Lucy is actually, in some obscure technical sense, Darling Daughter’s dog. I let my daughter continue to believe that matters.
** Here in way-upstate New York, there’s a reasonable chance that any snow that falls after Thanksgiving will still be on the ground in late April.
Published in General
In the 18 years we lived in western New York state (near Rochester) I never did buy (or even use) a snowblower. I always contracted out that work. But I could understand why many of my neighbors loved theirs. The last few years we lived there our contractor cleared the driveway with what I called a giant snowblower – a skid steer tractor with a spiral blade and a chute on the front of it. Three passes and the 25 foot wide driveway was done. And unlike the results with a plow, there was no large pile of snow at the end of the driveway.
I’m impressed they could find one at that time of year! I expect they got some quizzing about why they were buying a snowblower in June.
Our son noted this during his college days in Potsdam (Clarkson University). Half as much annual snowfall as in Rochester, but what fell in Potsdam stayed.
One of the nicer features of the western part of the state is that there’s normally a couple of thaws in January and February, so we would see bare ground a few times during the winter, and the snow would not just accumulate continuously.
My sympathies and prayers for your loss, Hank.
I know what it’s like to lose Dad, but not Mom. Both are rough, no doubt, but I don’t know whether they’re different.
You have both my sympathies and prayers Henry. Be careful with that snowblower; cold seems to constrict the coronary arteries. I have had friends die both shoveling and snowblowing. Take it easy, rest and relax inside periodically while snowblowing. Last year I started paying for a snow service. I still touch up with a shovel, but the heavy lifting is done by a younger guy with professional equipment.
I’m sorry you lost your mother. I’m glad you’re not yet an orphan and can enjoy time with your father.
I was thinking of buying the Toro two-stage battery powered snowblower as it appears to be the best in the battery-powered category.
But our neighbor still gives us a good deal on plowing out our 200-foot driveway with a plow on his gas powered pickup, and the remainder I can clean up by hand.
So not yet. Maybe next year.
There are situations where it wouldn’t be the most suitable tool but here in southwest Michigan I think it would be just right. If we lived 20 or 30 miles closer to Lake Michigan, where the snowfalls are heavier, I’m not sure.
Man, I just mowed my lots yesterday! But, looking ahead already to 2023, I did exhaust the fuel in the Troy-Bilt. (Slogan: “Wasn’t built just south of Henry Racette’s home, but it should’ve been!”)
Praise, to the skies, for the deft use of the word “halcyon.”
Sorry for the loss of your mother. Rejoice for all those adult years you had, I’m sure you do.
So your mother’s time has come; hospice care and support can be such a comfort. I’m glad that your dad is carrying on so well. And that you can spend time with him to comfort him. Be well, Hank. Peace and blessings to all.
I’m so sorry for the loss of your Mom. That hurts.
What a wonderful thing to write…and to be able to write…of your parents, Henry. You’re blessed, and a blessing in your turn.
Just a note, equipment such as snow blowers should be run from no-ethanol gasoline. It’s been discussed in the past on Ricochet, and there are sites that will show places to buy it in different areas.