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For the past decade or so, many of us around here have joked that we really needed a good old-fashioned hard winter. Heavy snows would improve Colorado's erratic water supply, of course, but our motives were not so generous.
We figured that a few months of arctic misery would drive out the lightweights who migrated here in recent years. There would be many mornings when their cars would not start. And even if the car did start, there would be nowhere to go, on account of closed roads. If the roads were plowed, they would still be as slick as greased glass, so that the borrow ditches exerted an irresistible attractive force.
Staying home would be the sensible option, except that the propane tank was almost empty, as was the larder. There is no running water because the pipes are frozen. The electricity, despite the valiant efforts of the local co-op, would arrive sporadically, and attempts to call the county dispatcher and demand immediate emergency plowing would be met with sarcastic laughter, if the call even went through.
Have that happen about once a month from November to April, and these pantywaist newcomers would be gone by Memorial Day. Meanwhile, we veteran Coloradans, a tough and hardy bunch, would be sitting comfortably with our woodpiles and canned-food stores, enjoying quiet evenings of cribbage by lantern light.
We do appear to be getting such a winter now, with storm after storm, and many sub-zero nights, but the rest of this montane reverie is mere fantasy.
For one thing, winter hits much harder on the plains than in the mountains. Most of last week, there were frequent announcements on radio and TV of schools delayed or closed on account of the storms. They were out on the plains; in 125 years of operation, Leadville's public schools have never closed on account of snow.
Leadville is the highest city in the U.S. (Alma, about
15 miles away on the other side of Mosquito Pass, is the
highest town), and note that a July 4 baseball game there
was once canceled on account of snow. Miners there used to
joke that I sure hope summer comes on a weekend this
year, because I had to work through it last year.
But if there's any part of Colorado with a climate designed to discourage the faint-hearted, it's the high plains, not the mountains. They're hotter in the summer and there's nothing to stop the wind in the winter. The high plains were the last part of Colorado to be settled, and they may be the first part to be abandoned -- Baca, Kiowa, Otero, Sedgwick and Washington counties all have fewer people now than they did in 1980.
Back to the mountains, where even if you think you're prepared, you're not. I had a good supply of firewood to feed the air-tight stove in our living room, a device with only one flaw. Productivity suffers greatly because I'm tempted to relax next to the warm fire after pushing one of the cats out of her customary place, and sometimes hours pass before I return to work.
The woodpile is back by the alley. Just about every afternoon, I go there with a wheelbarrow that I fill with wood, splitting it then as necessary. Then I wheel the load to the front porch, convenient to the stove. This route takes me on the shady north side of the house, where the wheelbarrow has packed the snow into a foot-high ice ridge that probably won't melt until March. Footing is perilous, and even if I can keep myself from tipping, the wheelbarrow often does
Thoughts of tropical beaches appear. Then I think of the tragic tsunami pictures and realize they have their problems, too.
This winter it has dawned on me. The people who live in cities and brave daily commutes, long drives to ski resources, ice-covered freeways, constant highway construction, frequent changes in jobs and residence -- they're the tough ones. Up here, we don't adapt well to change and surprise, like this miserably cold and wet winter.
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