Laugh

Today’s value to consider is, “laugh.”

My mom and I shared lots of inside jokes and laughed often when retelling stories from my childhood. I hold onto these memories even tighter now that she’s gone. Here’s one we loved reminiscing about especially when winter was coming…

We lived on about seven acres of land with a long driveway that followed the rolling landscape from the road, through a valley, and up to the house. During the winter, we used a Jeep with a plow to push the snow out of the way. One night, the weather forecast called for heavy snow and a blustery night. The wind adds an extra complexity to the mix because it can push the snow around creating very large drifts.

For my mom to get to work the next morning (and for me to get to school assuming we didn’t have a snow day), we planned to get up once in the middle of the night to clear the snow so that it was more manageable at 7 am. So, we set our alarms and at 2 am, we went to the garage in our pajamas, and climbed in the Jeep. I was probably 15 at the time, but my mom was the designated plow driver since my dad was often traveling for business.

It was snowing pretty hard as we pushed out of the garage and made the first passes in the parking areas near the house. There was a lot of snow, but the plow managed to clear it from the asphalt. Next was the long and undulating driveway. My mom angled the plow to the right, faced the vehicle to the road, and began pushing the snow. About a third of the way down the hill, we could see the snow was already nearly breaching the top of the plow. This was not a good sign. She continued to move forward, keeping the throttle constant. As we descended further, the crunching of the snow got louder, and we began to slow. Mere feet later, the plow seemingly hit a wall.

It wouldn’t budge. Wouldn’t plow any further. We attempted to reverse, but even the four-wheel drive low-range gearing couldn’t overcome the weight of the snow and the lack of traction. We were stuck. I moved to get out of the jeep to see the extent of the stuckness. But when I pulled the handle and pushed the door out, it barely budged an inch. I looked out the window and found that we were in a snow drift up to the middle of the Jeep’s doors. Uh oh. I asked my mom if her door was blocked too. It was. We knew we were in trouble. We sat for a minute then did the only thing we could think to do. We climbed through the backseats, to the cargo area and pushed open the rear hatch. We crawled out of the car and walked back through the whiteout to the house. When we got inside, my mom put on a pot of hot water to make tea and we sat in the kitchen and both just started laughing.

What a time. Middle of the night, stuck in our own driveway. Fortunately, we were now warm and toasty inside and free from work and school in the morning since our egress was blocked and our transportation beached in the white snow. 

So long for now.

-Felix