another sign of recovery

last night, old man winter visited my neck of the woods for the first time this season; he dropped about 7 or 8 inches of the white stuff on us before he was done.

since i had no particular place to go this morning and i wasn't looking forward to shoveling the driveway, i sat around in my sweats, drinking coffee and surfing the web until lunchtime. then, when i thought i'd put it off long enough (sometime after lunch), i put on my felt-packs and pullover hat and the rest of my snow gear, and headed out to tackle the job.

when i opened the garage door and started shoveling, my first thought was, "wow! this is perfect 'snowman' snow!" (and it was; thick, heavy, wet snow that, as a kid, i would've described as "good packing" snow - perfect for building snowmen or snow forts; also perfect for making snowballs...) - i found myself wishing i had some kids, so i could watch them build a snowman and maybe a couple of snow forts on the front lawn, where they could have a snowball fight...

o.k.; i know you're waiting for the punch line - and no, i didn't make a snowman, or a fort, or even a snowball; just kept shoveling the driveway - "so what's the sign?", you wonder...

here it is: last year, the first time we got a snow like this (in fact, every time we got a snow like this) and i had to go out to shovel the driveway, i thought of this kind of snow as "heart-attack" snow.

i distinctly remember one time last winter when i was shoveling out the top of the driveway (up where it meets the road, and the plows push gigantic piles of slush onto it), i was actually picturing one of our local newscasters saying, "police believe the man had a heart attack while shoveling his driveway and fell into the road, where the truck ran him over; paramedics at the scene think he was probably dead before he hit the road.", and they were showing my picture in the background...

so there it is; another sign of recovery: same driveway, same kind of snow, similar amount of snow, different world-view.

snowmen vs. sudden death.

what a shift...

kevin - day 21