Category: Ice

I’ve never been a fan of winter. Having lived in New England for most of my life, I do enjoy having four distinct seasons, and I love the sight of the snow falling outdoors, provided I don’t have to commute in it. White Christmases are wonderful, but those have been a hit or miss proposition over the years. Before MS entered my world, I enjoyed frolicking in the snow, engaging in snowball fights, sledding down a steep hill, and even removing snow from the driveway and sidewalks, at least some of the time. I don’t mind the chilly temperatures. but could do without the bitter cold and wind. The truth is, once the Super Bowl is over, I’m ready for spring, but February and March seem to last forever.

Getting around during the winter could be cumbersome at times, but it was never unmanageable.  Over the last several years however, clearing portions of the driveway and sidewalks have become progressively more difficult. So has been getting around on a snowy terrain. Nonetheless, there wasn’t anything winter could throw at me that I couldn’t handle, until this year, that is. There is an old foe that I have succumbed to, whom I no longer bother trying to challenge. That foe is ice.

Ice has become the bane of my winter existence. We rarely get ice storms, but the snow invariably leaves frozen stretches on my driveway and sidewalks regardless of how well they are plowed or cleared. Plus, the snow often turns into slush, which freezes easily.  Worst of all, the snow on or surrounding these surfaces melt during the day and re-freeze at night, leaving a flat, frozen, and often invisible slick of black ice that can easily take me down. And if there is a melt followed by a long stretch of subfreezing weather, the ice can linger for days, but I digress.

We received our first snowfall of the year last week. It wasn’t a large accumulation, and the snow was easy to remove. The next day was clear, the sun was bright and a lot of the snow melted. When the sun set, the temps dipped below freezing and the standing water froze solid. I ventured outside the following morning to move something in the back yard, and had to cross the driveway to do it. On my way there, I mistakenly stepped on one of those frozen slicks and stopped dead in my tracks.

I used to be able to simply shuffle my feet along an icy surface to get where I needed to go, but the deteriorating balance has made that more difficult. What little strength or control I have in the bad leg is rendered moot by a slick surface, and the good leg, which handles most of the body weight, tends to slide more on icy surfaces because of the weight it handles. If that slides out from under me, I would lose complete control and the results would be both comical and ugly.

Unfortunately, I was on a slanted surface, and I soon learned that negotiating icy surfaces that are even remotely slanted is impossible. Gravity takes over, my body starts leaning, and my feet started sliding. Even my cane was rendered useless because rubber-tipped canes have no traction on ice.

I was literally stranded on what looked like a four by four section of driveway, and I was completely helpless and vulnerable. I couldn’t crawl, because that meant I would have to move my feet to get onto my knees, but if I did that, they could slide out from under me. I couldn’t gingerly slide my feet either because the bad leg was on the downhill slide of the slant and kept moving in that direction. I could see myself doing a split on the ice, tearing my groin and hamstrings in the process, howling in pain.

After the initial panic subsided, I saw that all I had to do was reach over, plant the cane into a small pile snow that was within arm’s reach at the edge of the driveway, and pull myself off across the remaining two or three feet without having to lift my feet off the ground. Once I was on solid, snow covered ground, I waddled a few feet down the snowy lawn until I reached a flatter, unfrozen section to the driveway, and made my way back into the house.

With ice, every step is an disaster waiting to happen. It snowed again yesterday and left a thin film on the driveway and sidewalk. When I went to get the mail, I swear I heard the theme from the movie Jaws playing in my head, except the slick sidewalk was lurking  instead of a Great White Shark. It didn’t bite me this time because the snow that covered parts of the walk did not have an icy foundation, and my feet could easily grip the snowy surface.

Public parking lots and sidewalks are even worse. At least I can to a certain extent control how well my home base is maintained when it comes to snow and ice removal, but all bets are off in pubic areas. At least the handicap parking areas are close to most entrances, provided some yahoo hasn’t decided to take the last open spot to park in because there wasn’t an open space nearby.

I once toyed with the idea of  moving to a warmer climate when my working days are over, but as much as I dislike being cold and dealing with the snow, heat and MS are not a good match, so I don’t see myself leaving New England permanently. Maybe finding a more temperate place to live from January through March is the next best thing.

Either that, or I need invest in a lot of driveway salt. Maybe wearing a helmet, shoulder, elbow and knee pads when I venture outside would be a good idea too!