By the time Ray woke up and we had lunch, the snow had stopped and he decided that it was time to snow blow the driveway and area. It can be a bit delicate when trying to help out Ray. There is no shortage of assistance if he wants it, his kids are happy to help out, in fact they'd love nothing better than to help him, his veterans organization would happily send out someone to assist and pay the bill if he wanted it. That's the kicker though; if he wants it. I think that it's easy for many of us to assume that someone would welcome help when they get tired more easily and what used to be easy to do is not so easy anymore, but I don't think it works that way. I try to imagine what it's going to be like when I'm considered "elderly" and maybe I won't want too much help either. I can appreciate that independence becomes a cherished thing and the slope towards losing it can feel as slippery as the snow in the driveway.
However on the other side of the coin I really wanted to know how to use a snowblower. I've never operated one and it seemed kind of cool. I think Ray got tired of me following behind him like some eager puppy. After he had done the tricky parts he let me have a go on the very basic driveway. I watched Ray operate the machine with efficiency which gave me confidence that this should be easy... it was harder than I expected! The machine was heavy and I found myself fighting against it. It didn't take me long to realize I was making more work for myself and mostly I had to let the machine do what it does and I didn't have to push it or pull it, I just had to be patient - not exactly my forte.
The way I see it the trick to being useful is to remember that "useful" is a relative term and it's not so much about what I consider useful when I'm offering to help, but it's more about what Ray considers useful. Perhaps this is the conundrum of all kids whose parents are senior citizens, we want to make things easier but perhaps that's not what they need or appreciate. I mean when our parents still have all their marbles and aren't unfortunate enough to be dealing with the nastiness of dementia or Alzheimer's. The sticky wicket of course can come down to matters of opinion on what we (the adult children) think the parent needs and what they themselves think they need. I'm lucky in this respect as both mom and Ray haven't lost one ounce of their faculties regarding making their own decisions. It matters less whether I agree with their choices and more that I respect them regardless.
After we finished clearing all the snow, the weather was holding so I quickly snapped on the snowshoes and got out on the lake. The weather was just hovering around the freezing mark and all my tracks from two days before were long gone. I got out there to find that wet snow is HEAVY - duh. An extra workout for Lise! I had gone for a long road run (easy-peasy compared to snowshoeing) the day before so I probably wasn't as fresh as my enthusiasm was. I was running for maybe a minute before I had to walk. Snowshoe running in heavy snow feels like (or I imagine it feels like) when football players are training; running with tires in their way and they have to lift their legs up high to avoid tripping. The added challenge is doing this motion with the weight of your boots, the snowshoes and the snow itself. I decided that this felt more like speed intervals or hill training, if my burning legs and gasping breath were any indication.
I started to look for lovely snowmobile tracks along the lake as they definitely makes the traveling easier. By this time though the snow had started up again and I found myself in a sea of white with flat light that doesn't show any shadows or contours. Then it felt like I was imagining seeing skidoo track like some sort of mirage. I wondered about the Inuit who spend most of their lives in a frozen snow covered land and the idea of snow blindness started to make perfect sense to me.
I had a particular destination in mind for my run. A spot in the next bay over where I had spied some snow slopes that looked perfect for running hills in the snowshoes. Ya... I know this sounds like I'm a sucker for punishment and its true, there is a sadomasochistic relish in seeing a slope covered in deep powder and KNOWING it's going to be really tough. After slogging along walking and running, almost feeling like I was running on the spot in the snowy flatness of the frozen lake I finally made it to this hill. Once there I started to lose my nerve a bit as the open clearing was nestled between dense trees and my imagination began to wonder if there were critters in the woods - big critters like wolves or cougars.... I decided to ignore my nervousness and started up the hill. Crikey Shiela! The snow was DEEP and the weather was getting worse. Rather quickly I was slipping and post-holing even with my snowshoes. After I fell over once it became apparent that my poles would have been helpful.
I decided that this was probably not the best day for this type of adventure as the big blowing flakes were starting to settle on my Gortex jacket which wasn't feeling so waterproof and the visibility was shit. Not to mention that I hadn't brought anything with me in case I needed it; no first aid kit, no headlamp, no warm jacket... This little voice said "If anything goes wrong out here you are going to look like an unprepared asshole..."
Sometimes I actually do listen to my common sense and I decided to call it a day. And I figured that mom would start to worry as the weather had worsened since I started out.
As I made it back to our bay and was starting up to the front of the house, Ray opened the door and yelled out "Would you like me to fix you a drink honey?" "Hell yes! I replied. I could hear him laughing as he was closing the door. I had a big grin on my face too because I felt really damn lucky for reasons too numerous to mention. Snow blowing and blowing snow made for a great day!
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