A helping shovel

God, I love living here.

I did something daft on Wednesday, the day of the first big snow dump. I was supposed to be going to my friend Jean’s for a shower. She lives quite nearby. When I saw all the snow, I thought I should probably walk. But she works from home and it was a work day. I didn’t want to interrupt her more than necessary. If I drove over I could be in and out fairly quickly. Wouldn’t matter if I left with wet hair. So I rang to ask her what her road was like. “Someone’s been through,” she said. Oh, okay. By that I for some reason thought she meant the road had been ploughed. As soon as I got to the turn I realised that was not the case, but there were tire tracks I could follow and I did.

First mistake: Not walking.

Second mistake: Not pulling all the way into her drive, which she had shovelled, stopping instead near the street.

I needn’t have worried about how much time I’d take. She’d made lunch for us and was happy to stop work for more than an hour. Plenty of time to have dry hair before I left. 

No idea why I’d thought (perhaps I didn’t think) that, having driven into her drive at an angle, I could reverse out at a different angle.  Wedged the rear of the car into a snow bank, wheels spinning. Argh. Went back to house to get snow shovel. Jean, bless her, came out with a big bag of cat litter. Nope. No good. Well, I couldn’t leave the car in the middle of the road, so I faffed around until I managed to get it back into the drive and this time I did keep going so I could park it at the side of the house. Then I walked home. Duh.

Three days later. The snowplough had been round (adding a nice wall of snow at the bottom of her drive) and it was raining. Walked over to her place, shovelled an opening in the snow. (Shovelling slush is a lot harder than shovelling fresh snow.) Reversed out of the side of the house parking spot so I was at least going down the drive facing forward. Managed to get out with little difficulty.

As there were things I needed in the village and those roads were clear, decided to do a bit of shopping before heading home. 

As I approached my driveway I did think, “Hmm. I can get over and past that pile of ploughed snow at the bottom, can’t I?” Answer: nearly. Made it so far and no further before the wheels were spinning uselessly. Got out of car and had a look. Hmm. Technically the car was off the road, but only just. Too close to be certain it wouldn’t be sideswiped by some idiot. Into the shed to get the snow shovel, back down to the end of the drive to start shovelling slush. Within what seemed like less than a minute Bud, my neighbour from across the road, had appeared with his own snow shovel. It seems he’d been on his way to his woodshed when he spotted me shovelling. We’d been at it for another minute when a passing truck stopped and a woman unrolled her window to ask if we needed help. We thanked her for the offer, but said we were fine. Several minutes later, my neighbour Andrew, who’d been shovelling his own driveway beside mine, turned up after hearing voices and obvious shovelling noises. Bag of cat litter fetched from shed. Get back in car, reverse out of drive and, following Bud’s directions, position wheels for a straight run. As soon as I was a reasonable distance up the drive I stopped. No point in going further and getting stuck again trying to turn around.

Out of the car and back down the drive to thank Bud and Andrew for their help and tell them the story of stupidly stranding the car at my friend’s place. I tell them how lucky I feel about my neighbours and say my friend Jean would be a bit jealous.

When I got back inside the house there was a message from Jean checking to see I’d got home okay. I rang her back and told her about the community shovelling. “Where were my neighbours when I was shovelling?” she asked. I laughed and said that was exactly what I’d told them she’d say.

I am so lucky.