The Snow!

Looks like this year will turn out to be a record-breaking one for snow received in the Ottawa area, according to Environment Canada. Not that we haven't had our share of other winter related weather events, like freezing rain, snow pellets and hail. But it's the sheer amount of the snow that has outdone itself in winter weather performance this year.

When we went out yesterday for our usual ravine walk, it was into the first hour of an all-day snowfall, and heavy snow squalls. (Later in the day, when we went out to do our weekly grocery shopping, we had quite another perspective of the weather. Major roads, not all that far from our house, barely plowed, were slippery, but traffic was light. On our post-shopping return, we experienced one white-out after another as wind and snow conspired.)

The trails weren't too bad; where the day before they were so icy-crisp, our cleated boots crushed and clacked over the slickered snow. They were like that, because on Monday we had experienced another winter treat; wicked winds and freezing rain, ice pellets and snow, then more of everything, so the abundant snowpack was transformed - at least on its surface - to a slick, shining carapace over which no one dared tread without cleats.

Yesterday we managed well enough, the trails not yet heavy with snow, just beginning to accumulate. And the trees of course presented as a vision in white, limning all the evergreens, plastering over the trunks of the hardwoods. The wind whipping the thickly-falling snow into our faces as we proceeded. Too cold for Button and Riley to be out unbooted, so they were at a disadvantage, since the snow wouldn't stick to the ice, and they slid repeatedly.

Today though, after yesterday's all-day snow falling well into the night, we were left with a foot of loose snow everywhere. And that makes for tough conditions, clambering downhill and climbing uphill. Tediously slow, ambitiously arduous. Although a few walkers had been out before us, tamping the snow down somewhat, somewhat wasn't near enough. Our little dogs, walking behind me, in front of my husband, just barely managed.

Finally, the littler of the two, Riley, had to be picked up and carried, while the other, Button, forged bravely on, her long capable legs up to the job of plodding through deep snow, while Riley, with his stubby little legs ended up doing his best to swim through it, since the snow reached his belly, and proved to be too difficult for him to proceed on his own. The wind was still sharp, still smarted our faces.

It was sufficiently energetic to sway the tops of the conifers, and to make the bare trunks of tall poplars and oaks clack as they hit one another from time to time, swaying to the rhythm of the wind's pressure. But the sun was out, illuminating the landscape, and the scene could not have been more brilliantly beautiful. So that, when we returned finally to the house, I decided I'd gear myself up to go out and begin my volunteer canvassing.

This time for the Ontario March of Dimes. Those driveways that hadn't been shovelled free of their tall padding of snow weren't visited by me, this day. I selected other, cleaned-off drives, and in enough of them the underlying ice lay awaiting the unwary, so progress was slow and deliberate. Nice to see neighbours again, after what is proving to be a long winter where few of them venture out of doors unless they must.

And our neighbours are such nice people, and so welcoming, so eager to indulge in neighbourly conversations, it's difficult to get away. I've got to hear about all the latest news in their families, and truth is, I don't really mind all that much. If nothing else, it offers an opportunity to warm up in their foyers, coming in from the cold. And the reward is always a generous cheque for charity.