arese over teakettle

Many of you (some not so much) are aware that the eastern seaboard was hit with a mighty Nor'easter this week. Our neighborhood escaped relatively unscathed. We were not among the 107,000 without power for 2-3 days in temps with windchills below zero. We didn't get a whole lot of ice, so we didn't lose any trees either. With school and work cancelled, Tad & I spent our Valentine's day lounging in pajamas until we decided to shovel the walks after lunch.

We bundled up the kiddies and ourselves and headed outside for our midwinter gym membership supplement. Nothing like a good snow to show you how out of shape you are. At some point, I lifted a shovel too full of show and some sort of ligament or tendon in my pelvic area let me know. It was one of the ones damaged by carrying my 9-pound Lartian in 2001. Yeah - one of those. Amid the cries of our young, "Can we go in yet?? It's too cold. You don't have to shovel the whole neighborhood. C'mon! Please can we go in??" we were satisfied with the drying pavement in the driveway and decided against cleaning off the cars. We left them with their windshields completely covered with about six inches of snow and icepack. Wow. What a horrifyingly stupid idea.

The next morning, I lay in my bed groaning, next to Tad, who happened to be lying in my bed groaning too. Schools were cancelled again and he called out "sore" for the half-day he was scheduled to work. I could barely walk upright, due to that special tendon of mine. I kind of half-shuffled, stooped-over like Gollom from LOTR. By noon, however, the Aleve had kicked in and Tad & I were feeling good. No work, no school, the sun is out...this is a pretty good day. Our neighbors had watched us cautiously through their windows the day before. Now they were cursing themselves and us for getting the work done yesterday when it was less windy, warmer, and not re-frozen; they were having one hell of a time finding their own driveways. Nobody even touched the sidewalks. The hard-packed snow and sleet, with a fine layer of powder on top, was crappy for shoveling, making snowmen, snow forts, and snow balls, but would make for some awesome sledding! So we bundled up the kiddies once again, and headed for the park.

The park is far enough away that we decided to drive, in case of an injury or someone just too cold to walk all the way home. Which meant we had to chip out our windshields. I wish we’d thought to do that yesterday!! We had to do both cars because Tad was parked behind me and he had to see to move his car out of the way….. Twenty minutes later, I could no longer feel my thumbs. We managed to clear the windows, swap cars and were on our way. I had the camera and the cell phone in the deep pockets of my Air Force issued field jacket. The first trip down the hill, the girls wiped out and Princess ended up with a scraped face, similar to road rash. It wasn’t serious, but she then insisted that we all go home. Not a chance. I cleaned her up in the car and then proceeded to teach my stumble-bunnies how to steer the sleds. Lots of fun, belly laughs, and screams followed. For some reason we were the only people at the park, even though these were some wicked sledding slopes.

We stayed out for a whole hour, which was better than I expected, despite the biting wind. We were all able to stand on the snowpack without breaking through, so it was just like sledding on solid ice. I have about 20 or so great shots for the scrapbook. We had a couple more minor injuries. the Lartian insisted on sledding down the hill repeatedly without a sled, causing him to skin his chin and Tad foolishly went down on his belly and demonstrated why we don’t sled on our stomachs on ice. He didn’t knock out his tooth, but it might be a bit loosened. When we all decided it was cocoa-time, I carried the littlest to the car and Tad proceeded to sled the kids – downhill – to the car. Not such a bright idea. I managed to get the Princess into the car and get behind the car just in time to make a snap decision. Either Schmoo was going face-first into the tailpipe of the car, or into my tailpipe. I chose mine.

I’m sure it was an America’s Funniest Home Videos moment; Tad assures me that I looked awesome going arse over teakettle in the parking lot. I remember a roller-coaster sensation and managed in mid-air to grab Schmoo by the scruff of his neck before landing squarely on the cell phone; my shoulder (injured in 1998) took some damage as well. My son’s sled stopped less than a foot from the car’s rear bumper. My work here was done.

Between the horrific rectangular bruise that will soon appear on my left hip joint, the searing pain underneath my shoulder blade, the bruised knuckles courtesy of my windshield, and the general malaise felt by one who has shoveled snow for the first time this season, I feel about 97 years old right now. My hands were curled into almost arthritic claws this morning, and I am no longer hobbling, but it will be a while before I say, “Yay! Let’s go sledding!”

Oh, and I just discovered that our heat is out for real this time. Apparently last week was just a practice run. Joy.