Wrecked

The big snow of last weekend is receding.  It is now down to a mere 20”.  Rain today and tomorrow might do some of the work of removing it.

Temperatures have risen, but life is far from back to normal.  Traffic on side streets is still jammed. Sidewalks are treacherous.  And there is no place to park unless you are already parked.

Yesterday I set about the chore of digging out the car.  Job all done, snowed piled high on the few available feet between automobile and sidewalk, I looked at my finished project and said, “Damn ’f I move you.  Not about to ride around looking for a place to park after all this.”  So I will wait till the snow is much more nearly gone before I elect to drive anywhere. 

All dug out and no place to go.

We had a couple of huge snowstorms six years ago.  It was weeks before we could go anywhere.  Not because the roads were impassible, but because there was no place to park when we got to our destination, and no place to park when we returned.  Literally.  Truly.  And, believe it or not, life changed permanently.   The months-long break kept us away from weekly dancing.  It interrupted and nearly killed our regular yoga discipline. It prevented regular visits to the gym for I don’t know how long. 

What do people do when something really calamitous happens?  War, for example.  When the entire landscape explodes, when the high-rise that is home looks like a pathetic trashed doll house with no façade, and one-time private family quarters hang exposed for all to see, what do people do?  How do they cope?  

Of course, I shouldn’t complain about something as minor as a snowstorm.  It is a hangnail compared to the horrors of an eviscerated world.  So I won’t complain.  I think I’ll be grateful.  Not because we got off easy, with minimal disruption, but because this irritating little incident is about the only thing in my life that can make me a tad more aware of what many in the world have to deal with day in and day out. 

Much of the world’s population is in the fix of the rabbit at the beginning of Watership Down crying “Zoar!” because an earthmover has bulldozed his warren and the tragedy is unbearable.

© Frank Gasque Dunn, 2016