Nor'easter

If you've seen the news today, you know that New England got hit hard yesterday with a blizzard. The snow started falling, lightly, early in the morning—lightly enough that the kids went to school. When I picked up Julie at preschool at 1:00, it was still falling, perhaps a little more heavily, but nothing too bad. Soon enough, though, it really began to start swirling. That's the moment when I made a error in judgment: I should have gone right over to the school and picked the kids up instead of waiting for dismissal time at 3:00. (In case you're wondering, there would have to be a major emergency for them to send kids home from school before dismissal time, because they'd never be able to reach all the parents and it would be utter chaos.)

We live just a few blocks from school, but I couldn't figure out how to get there. Julie is too small to walk through such deep snow, she's too heavy for me to carry her all that way, and there was no way a stroller would be able to make it through the snow. So we got in the car. It was the worst driving conditions I've ever experienced. I could barely get the car out of the driveway, and once I was on the street, I couldn't see a thing. It was a complete whiteout. I made my way slowly down the street, but then what? I had to find a place to park that was far enough over to the side that I wouldn't get hit but not so far over that I'd get stuck. I did the best I could, about a block from the school, then carried Julie from the car. The wind was whipping little ice particles all around our faces; I could barely keep my eyes open and Julie was crying. We made it into the school, got the kids, and went back out to the car. The drive home was just as terrifying. The defogger wasn't working fast enough, so I had my head out the window, trying out make out other cars' head- and tail-lights. We got home, but I couldn't maneuver the car back into the driveway. At one point I was stuck at an angle that completely blocked the road. I finally managed to pull over pretty close to the side, and we went into the house for hot chocolate. By about 3:45 or so, the wind and all precipitation had vanished, but the snow was of course still everywhere.

Andy spent nearly 2 hours driving his usual 20-minute commute; he promptly began shoveling the driveway and got both cars into the garage.

Brooke definitely wins the Most Valuable Player award for the day. She called from work at about 4:00 to see whether we still wanted her to babysit; I said that it was up to her whether she wanted to drive here. She left right about then and drove straight to our house, which also took about 2 hours for an otherwise 20-minute commute.

So we walked to our neighbors' party two houses down the street and had a very nice evening. Talk invariably turned to comparisons of snowblowers; I think it's time we got one! We have a guy who comes to plow our driveway and shovel our stairs—and he did come sometime in the middle of the night—but Andy certainly would have been saved a lot of back-breaking work if we'd had one.

Here's a scene of three happy kids today:

Comments

[Liz]

I'm a 4 minute walk from Henry's school. I took the jog stroller with the enormous wheels and I could barely push it through the snow. Nina screamed the whole way down. The snow and ice were whipping our faces. Whew! It felt good to get inside. We also had hot chocolate.

[susanswords]

Hi there, I found you via BE
Ugh, I am from MA and do not miss this stuff at all :-) Especially days like the day you had. I'm glad you made it home okay :-)

[Julee]

I so do not miss that!

[Kathy]

I miss December snows with the christmas lights twinkling through the white snow, it looks so magical. But I do not miss shoveling/snowblowing and trudging through the snow to get to work (when I lived in Boston with no car). My kids keep wishing it would snow here!

[Mquest]

In Southern California we have been hitting the low 40's. I
Actually had to use my defroster for longer than 5 minutes the other day.

The story of your drive was rather scary. I was on the edge of my seat.
That was some great story telling and writing. Drive safe.

[Angie]

I had an experience very much like yours. It was snowing already when I dropped my two boys off at school. By noon they were calling to let people know that they were being let out early. There was already six inches of snow on the ground. I and my two year old daughter set off to pick the boys up. On the way there my friend Rita called and asked if I could pick her son up as well as she couldn't get the car out of her driveway. I said fine and continued on my way. The roads were bad and I almost got stuck as I pulled out of the school parking lot. As I pulled onto Rita's street, which is a cul-de-sac, I noticed that it was not plowed at all. My mini-van struggled to make it to her house at the end. As i went to leave, the wheels just spun. I couldn't go backwards or fowards. I tried going back and forth for about 20 minutes. Finally a man came out of his house to help push me on my way. He got me out of the spot I was in only to have the van skid sideways as I made my way out of the circle and get stuck again. He once again got me going and I was able to go with out getting stuck again until I got home, where like you I got stuck trying to get into my driveway. After a few minutes of spinning my wheels however, I was able to get it in.

[Kathy]

That's the worst thing that can happen when you have young kids. I got stuck once when picking my daughter up from ice skating. kids up from day care. My kids were 9, 3 and 1 at the time. I made the mistake of sneaking a cigarette before getting in the car with the kids. In the mean time, the parking lot cleared out with everyone leaving. As I backed out of my parking spot, my back tire got stuck in a rut made by one of those big suv vehicles. I tried going back and forth for several minutes, but I was stuck good. Worse of all, between my getting upset, and the loud sound of the spinning wheels, both of my younger kids were now scarred and begining to cry. After about 25 minutes, a plow truck came to clear the parking lot and he was able to get me on my way.

[Nichole]

I hate when the school lets the kid off early. I work in a hospital where I;m not allowed to take off. I can get an hour off to pick the kids up and run then to my moms, but no matter what the weather, I have to get back to work. Last December I ran to pck the kid up and drop then at my mom's. My car was all over the road. And when I got back to the hospital, the lot was now full as no one wanted to park on the street. I now had to. About two blocks away. When I got off work around midnight, I found a pile of snow plowed next to my car that was about three feet deep. Even with my four wheel drive jeep, it took me thirty minutes to get out of the spot. At one point, the wheels were just spinning and I thought I was going to have to spend the night.