Shoveling the roof
The photo above was taken before Christmas. It was one of the many below zero days we, as hardy Northlanders, recently endured. -15F that day, to be exact. Since then, I’ve recorded three days colder than thirty below (-34, -32, and -31) on my car thermometer. Here in the Cloquet River Valley, our weather is usually closer to what’s being experienced in Hibbing or Tower or Embarrass (despite the fact we’re only about ten miles as the eagle flies from the airport) than Duluth’s reported temps.
Speaking of eagles. It’s 7:35am on Saturday as I type this, listening to Ramblin’ Jack Elliot tell a story on West Coast Live on KUMD. There’s no sunrise to greet me as I cobble, first a book review (see below) and then this blog. It’s a gray, dismal, northern Minnesota January day. But the fact that a bald eagle just flew within fifty feet of my iMac, and that it’s nearly twenty degrees above zero outside, well, those facts alone make it worthwhile to be in this place, in this house, living this life.
Anyway, back to the photo. The roof of our house has one place that’s susceptible to ice dams and the all-too-familiar leaks that follow. You can’t really see it in the photo but just below the freshly shoveled shingles, three roofs meet in one place, creating a niche, if you will, perfect for the formation of ice. Ice that, if permitted to perpetuate, will eventually stop the flow of the melt, which in turn, will cause the water to seek the easiest path, which in turn, will seep into the house. That’s happened twice in our 14 years in this house. I don’t want it to happen again. And so, shortly before the craziness of Christmas (both sides of the family were here on two different days to eat, drink, play the dice game for awful presents, and generally have a pretty good time), I donned my Carhartt insulated bibs and jacket, winter boots, gloves, and stocking hat, pulled out our extension ladder, found a couple of snow shovels, and dragged my tired old ass up onto the roof of the house. Four hours later, I had the suspect areas free of snow. I was dog tired and ornery. But all the snow I’d tossed from the roof loomed up at me from the front sidewalk. I took a short break and then, after another half hour of shoveling, the deed was done. At least until the next big snow.
I love snow. I’m a downhill and cross country skier. I also own snowshoes, though I rarely use them, preferring instead the steady glide of skis to tromping through knee high powder on aluminum and mesh. But the point is, with the temperature hovering close to deadly for most of the holiday season, my opportunities to ski on the trails that run through our land have been limited. Since November, I’ve only been able to get out on my cross country skis twice. I haven’t yet made it to Spirit Mountain to test my knees against gravity.
Kena loves -15!
The photo on the left is from one of my two recent excursion into nearby woods. That’s Kena, our seven-month-old Labrador, looking quizzically at her master, as if to ask, “So why, Old Man, are we stopping here?”
Kramer
General Custer, Survivor of the 1918 Fire
The dog on the far right is Kramer. He’s a rescue dog that my third son Chris brought home one weekend from River Falls, WI, where he was going to school. Kramer’s up there in years and, unlike Kena, who bounds through the snow like Tigger on Quaaludes, Kramer is content to follow behind my cross country skis, ambling patiently from place to place, staying firmly on the trail. The day these photos were taken, it was -15, the warmest it had been in a week. When I stopped at General Custer, my favorite white pine on the place, and laid back in the deep snow to take photos, Kena promptly jumped on my crotch to lick my face. Daisey, the third dog in my “crew”, stood off to one side watching the pup, satisfied to be outside of our heated garage where she and Kramer had been holed up during the deep freeze. The problem with taking photos of the tree? Beyond the fact there’s a dog’s hind end obscuring the bottom right hand corner of the shot is that I laid down on my back in the snow, my skis still on, to take the shot. I also momentarily forgot my age and the stiffness of my joints. It took a hell of a lot of effort to become vertical! I made it, but not before Kena had, in ways too indecent to describe in this family blog, her “way” with me.
Maybe the title of this piece is a bit over the top. I mean, I’ve spent 51 of my 59 years on Planet Earth either in Duluth or here, in Fredenberg Township along the banks of the Cloquet River. I should know that winters come and winters go. Some are cold and snowless. Some are warm and snowless. Some are cold and snowy. And some are just plain cold. Penetratingly, isolatingly, demandingly cold. How this winter will shake out in the next three or four months (one never knows, as last year showed us, what season April belongs to) is left to God and caprice. But though I relish the occasional below zero day; a day full of still, calm, windless moments of intense silence as proof that I am still alive; I’ve had enough cold for awhile. Bring on the snow. I want to slap on the boards and head over to Spirit Mountain for a few hours of night skiing. There’s nothing better than standing above the green, red, yellow, and white lights of the most beautiful city in Minnesota waiting to pounce on a mogul. Maybe I’ll see you there. I think we’ve had enough below zero weather for a while, don’t you?
Peace.
Mark
