Category: Winter

The Saddest Day of the Year

Pool

I covered the pool on Sunday, which is always a somber occasion. This episode was particularly weird, because the temps were in the mid-eighties, the humidity was high, and I was sweating profusely.

When to cover the pool is always a tricky proposition, because there are years where you could easily enjoy the water in mid to late September. Yesterday was such a day, in fact, but the reality is it was a hectic day and nobody had time for a leisurly swim. The other reality is we get far less daylight than we did even a month ago, and the evening temps will soon dip into the fifties, all of which will conspire to drop the water temperature precipitously.

There have been occasions where I’ve waited until late September or early October before completing this task. But after I froze my cojones by immersing myself into mid-sixty degree water to help remove the ladder many years ago, I vowed never to repeat that fool’s errand. It was not a pleasant experience, and I have since erred on the side of closing it too soon instead of too late, to avoid repeating it.

We call it the saddest day of the year because it represents summer’s symbolic end, and the beginning of the inexorable march to winter. The best time of the year is coming to a close, and the worst one is on its way. Plus, the pool is depressing to look at when the cover is on. During the spring and summer, looking at the sparkling blue water and colorful pool liner leaves you with a good feeling. All we have to look forward to now is the drab cover that will soon have rain and rotting leaves floating on its surface.

What makes this year’s closure particularly sad is the fact that this may be the last time we enjoy the pool. Normally, when the pool is closed you know it will eventually be reopened, and you take solace in that reality. The difference this year is that there are no gurantees that will happen next year.

We should be breaking ground on the new house soon, and if things go well, we will be living there, our current homestead will be sold, and the pool will become someone else’s property before the real heat of next summer hits. A pool at the new place will not be a priority. We certainly won’t consider it in year one, and the truth is we may never install another one.

That thought brings a bittwesweet nostalgia, because that is not only the house that Shodan grew up in, but he lived in that pool for a long time after we bought it. Conversely, so did I, and we both had a of fun in those ten thousand gallons of water over a long period of time.

Even though Shodan doesn’t go in the pool much now unless his little cousins or other company visits, not seeing that sparkling blue pool every day will represent a lost chapter of our lives. The new chapter that awaits means he has grown into a fine young adult whose journey is just starting. It represents a new chapter for me too, but my journey has a lot of uncertainties and is also a lot closer to the final chapter of my story than it was when we installed the pool.

I’m not planning on moving again unless it is in a hearse, and I will be visiting a new decade when my birthday arrives in March, so not only am I feeling my mortality. I’m also feeling a tsunami of sentimentality at the passing of such an innocent period of time.

So the saddest day of the year was more melancholy than most. Change is coming, which is not always a bad thing. But when you open the door to change, another door closes as you walk through it. Memories of birthday parties, and Santa Clause, and frog ponds, butterfly bushes, and that pool will be all that remain when that door clicks shut.

It’s part of life, I know, but in covering the pool, we also wrapped that part of our lives in a burial shroud. I’ve never given that much thought because I try not to waste energy and emotion dwelling on stuff that hasn’t happend yet. But putting the pool to bed for the winter was more than symbolic. For me, it made everything we are planning feel very real for the first time.

The sense of loss is palpable and lingers, but I know that will fade once we start seeing the new homestead rise from the ground and feel the anticipation of something new. For now, there is nothing new, we haven’t broken ground, and a large part of our life is under cover, perhaps permanentaly.

It’s a sobering feeling.

 

 

The Final Straw?

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Blizzard Brody visited our state back in December, but in hindsight it was a Blizzard in name only.  Yes it snowed, but the snowfall was not intense. Yes it was windy, but no power was lost and no trees were damaged. We’ve had some cold snaps since that storm, and a few snow events, but nothing cringe-worthy. Other than the fact that we’re into March and everyone is sick of winter, it’s been a pretty tame one.

Two days ago the talking heads started hyping winter storm Edna, and people overreacted as usual. Gas stations had lines going into them, and grocery stores were being wiped clean. You see, this storm was allegedly going to dump a bunch of wet, heavy snow on the region and pack winds that could cause damage. Heart attack snow, as the guy who does most of my driveway calls it.

Accumulation predictions had grown, which got my attention, but that was mostly for the Northwest Hills. Nonetheless, I decided to work from home yesterday. After all, even though we could get 6 to 12 inches when it was over, who wants to commute in that shit? According to the forecast, the snow would start around seven in the morning, intensify by ten, and conclude by ten in the evening.  When seven in the morning rolled around, it was cloudy and dry. By ten, there was a light rain falling.

The southeastern part of the state was supposed to get most of the rain and not a lot of snow. Maybe 3-4 inches. So when it started raining, I figured the storm’s track had moved. When I finished my work later in the afternoon, it was still drizzling. A few fat flakes would occasionally mix in, but nothing was coating the roads or ground.

I breathed a sigh of relief because my son, who I will refer to as Shodan, had a heavy cold and K was battling a nasty sinus infection. I was two days removed from a stomach virus myself, so I was more than happy that the weathermen screwed up yet another forecast and I wouldn’t have to worry about snow removal that night.

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Less than an hour later there were white-out conditions, and it remained that way for another seven hours. Knowing this stuff was going to be saturated with water and heavy as hell, I decided to remove the snow in stages because the last thing I wanted was to remove maybe a foot of wet heavy snow all at once. My not so big blower wouldn’t be able to handle that, which meant a lot of shovel work would be required, which was simply not going to happen.

Little did I know, Edna, which was not a blizzard, would put Brody to shame. Eighteen inches of snow fell over a six or seven hour period, so you do the math regarding how heavy it was coming down. The pictures you see here don’t do the storm justice because about a third of the snow had melted by the time I took them.

The first time I went out with the blower (Shodan had already taken a shower and was down for the count) four inches had already accumulated, and it took two hours to remove it from the section of the driveway the plow guy can’t reach, in addition to the front and back sidewalks.

After I came in and collapsed on the recliner for rest in front of the telly, I reluctantly ventured out back for the next go around and there was an additional eight inches on the ground. It was at that point I knew this storm was trouble. The wind was howling, the snow was coming down sideways, and at one point, a clap of thunder erupted and a flash of lightning whited everything out, scaring the hell out of me in the process.

When I was out there, my ankle was constantly bending, and it almost got to the point where I was walking on the side of the ankle instead of the bottom of my foot. The entire leg was so weak I could barely move it, and my good leg was screaming because it had to compensate for the compromised one. The back and hamstrings weren’t pleased either.

At one point, the bolt assembly that holds blower handle was loose, which I didn’t know, and became dislodged. Half the handle was in my hand, and I could not control the blower, which was slowly rolling down a small decline, and I had to hurry to keep pace with it before it came to rest in a snow bank. How I remained upright is beyond me. I was not happy, said every bad word I know, and made up a few in the process, for a solid minute.

The immediate issue was to find the bolt and screw because if I didn’t, they would get buried in the snow and perhaps lost forever, rendering the blower useless. So I got on my hands and knees, which was a chore, strained my eyes and blindly ran my gloved hands across the driveway surface in a raging snowstorm, hoping to see or find something that looked or felt like a long bolt and large hand screw. Fortunately, this happened quickly. Now that the “easy” part was over, I had to get back on my feet.

The first two attempts failed, so I literally crawled on my hands and knees to a car that was parked nearby, pull myself up, reassembled the handle, and get back to work. Round two took almost three hours and I didn’t even attempt the sidewalks.

When I was done, it was still snowing, and my leg wouldn’t move at all. I literally dragged it behind me until I got inside, laboriously removed the boots, knee brace, the AFO brace, which actually turned out to be a detriment, then peeled off a saturated coat, hat, gloves, scarf, snow pants, sweats and undergarments in a heap onto towel laid on the floor. I trudged up those long stairs, took a shower, gingerly headed back downstairs to the kitchen and poured myself a whiskey (no ice). It was close to 11pm, and sipped my drink in the quiet stillness.

Thoughts were swirling in my head: I can’t do this anymore, I don’t want to do this anymore, I can’t physically do this anymore, and I am so tired of dealing with this.

As stubborn as I am, and as much as I try not to give into this disability, I’m not stupid, and some things can’t be ignored. Storm Edna was a cold slap in the face in that regard. Twenty minutes later I fell into bed, my body ached from head to toe, and quickly fell asleep.

To add insult to injury, we lost power early this morning. My birthday morning. Not that I was surprised. The snow had coated all the tree limbs like a coating of white wax. It was a pretty spectacular sight actually, but all the limbs were bending terribly and you knew some would eventually snap. And snap they did. Over 40% of our town lost power, but ours fortunately came back on about a half hour ago. At least I’ll be warm tonight, be able to enjoy a hot meal and take a comfortable shower.

Still, the sidewalks and the snow that fell after I came in for the night had to be removed. It was a piece of cake by comparison, but I ache all over,

So now this whole moving thing becomes serious, not that is wasn’t before, because I don’t want to go through this again next winter. The need is more urgent with no solution in sight.  Maybe we’ll have to reassess out priorities. The easiest and most practical thing to do is move into one of those over 55 communities where all the outside stuff is taken care of, but I hate that idea. Plus they aren’t cheap and I would still have to make the interior ADA compliant.

There isn’t any land available in the section of town we want that has city water, so does that mean we need to look at neighboring towns? Don’t really like that option either. But something might have to give because that clicking clock has suddenly become very loud.

Meanwhile, I will enjoy the rest of my birthday and pray like hell that the next coastal storm/nor’easter that is forecast for Monday is a total rain event. I can’t take another yesterday.

 

 

 

 

 

The Winter Blues

blues

Snow.

Ice.

Wind.

Bitter Cold

Long, dark days.

I don’t generally complain about the winter or yearn for spring until after the Super Bowl, but here we are in the middle of January, I am so done with winter, and I’ve felt this way for weeks. I also don’t normally dwell on these kinds of developments, but this one has got me thinking because I think it’s significant.

While our snowfall this year is above normal, there have been much snowier winters within the last several years. The darkness thing is irrelevant because winters always suck in terms of the amount of daylight we get. It’s dark when I wake up, dark when I arrive at work, and mostly dark when I get home, as we have gained an hour of daylight the last few weeks. Still, I was watching television the other night and glanced at the clock, which read 8PM. It felt like it was 11PM.

It has been colder than a witch’s tit so far this winter, but the same can be said for most of this country, I think. We’ve had more wind-chill warnings than all of last year, and more than in recent memory. The ice doesn’t melt, and the wind cuts through one’s garments and bites at your skin. This is one of the reasons why spring can’t get here soon enough, but that isn’t the main reason.

The sad fact is this winter has been much harder hard physically than any winter I can remember, and I take that as a sign that there has been a fundamental change in how my symptoms have progressed. Everything has been a little harder this year, travelling for one, but I can manage most of these situations. Winters, unfortunately, are different. Walking outdoors often feels like negotiating a mine field. Since everything has  remained frozen for longer periods of time, each step represents a potential disaster. If I fall during any other season, it’s usually my fault for not paying attention, and it’s because of something stupid. The falls aren’t severe as I don’t lose complete control of my body, which give me more ability to protect my body before it hits the ground.

But falling during the winter is usually a true accident. Since I am paying close attention to every step, any mishap is a complete and sudden surprise caused by a patch of black ice I don’t see, or the rubber tip of my cane sliding off something slippery. Either way, result is a violent and suddenly unexpected shift of balance, which prevents me from positioning and cushioning my body before it hits the frozen terrain. Under these circumstances, the chance for broken bones, shredded ligaments, or both, is greater.  Neither has happened, and hopefully won’t because I’m hyper-focused most of the time when I am outside. But there have been a couple times moments so far this year where I was on the verge.

If that wasn’t bad enough, the constant toothache in my lower back and hip prove that my body is protesting more than ever before. I’m sure the extra strain on those areas  from not having the strength in my legs when I’m  working outside doesn’t help. More than any other year, the winter of 2017-2018 has become a test of endurance, both physically and mentally

So yes, I am fantasizing about spring and summer, but summer is no bargain either. Heat and humidity is no longer a friend of mine and can sap my energy in the blink of an eye, but it is easier to navigate without the snow and ice. Besides, I have always preferred sweating over freezing. At least you can wear comfortable clothes.

There isn’t a lot I can do for now other than complain. I’m not going to relocate south because the summer heat would kill me, and New England is my home. As I have mention in earlier posts, moving to a more MS friendly house is high on our list of priorities, but all that will do is make indoor and outdoor maintenance easier. It won’t change anything as far as navigating winter roads, driveways, parking lots, and sidewalks are concerned. It won’t stop the cold and won’t prevent having to deal with snow and ice.

We can spend January through March in warmer weather climates, but I don’t have a job where I can work from home all of the time. I am also, health permitting, seven to eight years from retirement, so that option won’t be on the table for a while.

At least it is supposed to get into the fifties tomorrow, but if the trends continue the way they have so far this year, it will be in the teens again soon thereafter. So much for a January thaw.

Alas, I’m stuck with having to endure winters for the foreseeable future, and have eight more weeks of this shit to endure before spring officially starts. I’ll manage, what choice is there?

And I will probably bitch and moan about the heat and humidity come summer.

 

Blizzard Brody Visits Connecticut

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We had our second winter storm of the year yesterday. The talking weather heads wavered on their snowfall forecasts in the days preceding the event, but nobody expected Winter Storm Brody to morph into Blizzard Brody.

The flakes started flying in the pre-dawn hours and didn’t finish falling until late afternoon/early evening. Somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen inches of snow fell. It was hard to determine how much we actually got because some areas had very little snow while others had drifts that were several feet high, compliments of strong, gusty winds, which whipped the snow around and created white-out conditions during the day. Needless to say, the wind chill was arctic. Fortunately, we did not lose power, which was my biggest concern because of the potential for freezing pipes.

As you know, I use these kinds of events as a measuring stick concerning my symptoms and progression. Snow removal of this magnitude had not been on the agenda for almost a year, so this experience would be a good way to gauge how I’m doing in terms of strength, balance, and general progression.  The verdict wasn’t good.

But it started out well. When I heard what was coming during the morning broadcasts, I heeded my wife’s advice to stay ahead of the storm, and cleared the sidewalks and the portion of the driveway our plow guy doesn’t touch before lunch. Our snowblower can handle a foot of snow or less, so if I waited until the storm was over before removing the snow, the blower might not have been much of a help. Getting rid of it in stages would make the evening removal a lot easier and less strenuous, or so I thought. Besides, I needed to remove the snow that had accumulated around the foundation and was threatening to cover the furnace vents, so if I had to bundle up to do that, why not stay outside and remove everything.

The task took a while to complete, but I came away from it in fine shape. Other than trying to open one of the doors that had been smothered in a snow drift, the task wasn’t physically demanding, and when I returned inside, I didn’t feel any different. Everything was working the same as it was before I ventured outside. So, when the snow finally stopped and it was time for round two, I expected nothing different. I knew there was a little more snow on the ground compared to the morning, but my son was going to do all the heavy work in the form of shoveling and getting rid of the stuff the town’s snow plows had dumped onto the sidewalk. All I needed to do was navigate the snowblower and clear the rest.

I was also better prepared, as I once again listened to the wife and wore both the AFO brace and the knee brace, which I didn’t bother with earlier. Everything was strapped on good and tight, so I felt confident that I wouldn’t have to worry about slipping or hurting myself.

It didn’t take very long to realize round two was going to be a struggle. Right from the start, the ankle kept turning to the right, and the knee followed. Planting the foot to get any push off of it became extremely difficult. The leg weakened quickly, and the balance followed. Like an inchworm, I was literally stepping forward with the good leg, and dragged the bad one behind it. With a little practice, moving straight ahead became easier, but turning and backing up was dicey. When the task was finally done about an hour and a half later, I couldn’t bend the leg at all. The weirdest thing was my bad leg actually felt shorter than the good one, perhaps because I couldn’t keep the ankle or knee straight. It was a good thing my son was there to do the shoveling, because I don’t think I would have been able to do it and remain upright. My balance was that bad.

When I finally made it inside, I had to sit on a chair to shed my winter garb, which was a first, and my wife had to remove my boots, also a first, because I could I couldn’t lift the leg, which was completely limp.

Fortunately, the snow was of the fluffy and dry variety, which made the job easier.  Having said that, my lower back currently feels like an alligator is chomping in on it, and my hip is barking. Both will feel worse tomorrow because the discomfort is always worse on the second day. Plus I had to do a little shoveling when I arrived home from work today, because tomorrow is garbage day, both of the containers were buried, and my son is not home.

Was last night’s experience the result of fatigue at the end of a long, busy day? Perhaps, but as I sit here twenty four hours later, the leg is still pretty weak, the ankle remains shot, and my foot is constantly drooping. I realize this sounds ludicrous, but I sometimes wonder if I’d be better off with a prothesis instead of a limb that feels like a lifeless piece of meat. At least I’d have more strength and better balance, or at least I think I would.

Is this a progression or simple weakness from a limb that isn’t used to working that hard? I have no idea, but suspect it’s more of a weakness issue because I have a similar experience when I get off the exercise bike after thirty minutes. At least I hope it is, because if this is my new normal, it is going to be a very long winter.

Temps are currently in the single digits and the wind, while not as brisk as yesterday, is enough to make the wind chill dangerous. It is bitterly cold out, so the snow will not be melting any time soon. I’ll need a week to recover from this episode and hope we don’t have another storm before then. And the next time it does snow, I hope we get less than a foot so it can be removed all at once instead of in multiple stages.

I know there will another big storm this winter, but pray we won’t have a repeat of four winters past, when it snowed every week for a couple of months, including one whopper of a storm that buried us with almost three feet of the white stuff. The piles of snow from the plow and snow blower became so high and wide that it got to the point where if it kept snowing, it would have been impossible to put it anywhere. Of course, that was four years ago, and my leg was a lot stronger than it is now, and my balance was infinitely better. If we were to ever have a winter like that again, I have no idea what we’d do.

Pray for hot rain, I guess.

 

 

Ice

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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!

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