Snow = Ouch + Scary Blizzard(s)
Had a big Michigan adventure this weekend. Brendan and our friend Jen and I all drove out to New Buffalo, and then onward about an hour or so east and north of there to a "ski" resort. Those of you who have ever seen a mountain, would probably laugh for a good long time at me freaking out about it.
However, having been an ungraceful flatlander my entire life, and being deathly afraid of heights (think escalators), not particularly liking cold or snow, and never having been on skis or a snowboard...this was definitely unnatural.
I bought my first pair of snowpants and skijacket ($22 down from $160!) and we all got a private lesson with the fetching (albeit) 22 year old Tex. Then it was onto the slopes. Um...I should start by saying. I didn't understand the lesson, except the falling bit. I learned how to fall REALLY well. Brendan and Jennifer both did very well. Brendan had it down about fifteen minutes into it. I'm jealous. And, Jen definitely got the hang of it faster, although had a couple of pretty hard falls that I'm sure she is feeling today.
I was particularly terrible at getting off the ski lift where they expected you to be able to actually snowboard down a four foot embankment without running into the people standing five feet away. High hopes, sad reality. I solved the running-into-people-issue by gracefully eating it in new and delightfully uncoordinated ways about two feet off the lift each and every time.
And, I also have to say that I am now currently in more pain than I was after the marathon AND the broken kneecap combined. I've been eating advil like skittles, and last night when I tried to roll over when I was sleeping, the pain woke me up and the...we'll call them "muscles"... in my shoulder and arms were so tight that I was only able to move in tiny fractional increments until I finally found myself in a sort of non-excruciating position.
That said...I would totally go again. It was fun.
What wasn't fun was the drive home. Getting to this area of Michigan means driving on two lane rural highways the entire time. It was dark when we left, and it started out fine, but about halfway there, we hit a genuine, oh-my-god-this-is-a-blizzard, blizzard. It was a full-fledged white out, and there are absolutely no streetlights on these roads to help give definition to the road ahead of you, nor is there consistent traffic enough to leave you snow tracks, so basically we couldn't see ten feet in front of the car. Hazards flashing, we had no choice but to keep going at about five miles an hour.
The only time you knew you were still on the road was from sporadic reflective signs and when other cars were coming toward you, because their headlights helped you see. It was very very scary. The problem is, you can't just stop. You have no idea where you are, and there aren't any houses nearby or even roads to pull off into. And if you pull onto the shoulder, someone might not see you and could clobber you. So, basically, I spent the entire time watching the shoulder just to make sure that we weren't veering off. It was the worst in all my years of driving in the snow in MI that I have ever experienced.
The weather reports had said no snow was supposed to happen until eleven o'clock at night. Unfortunately, Nature, she is her own woman.
But, Brendan did an excellent wonderful exceptional job of driving, and when we finally got about fifteen miles from home, it cleared up and there was no snow at all at our house in New Buffalo. So weird. It was like we imagined it.
Then, the next day we woke up, and snow HAD hit New Buffalo, so we looked on the radar to see where the snow was falling, and it was coming down in a straight line all the way down the lake through a strip of our drive through Indiana, but we figured if we stayed on the highway, we would be fine. And at least it was daytime.
No. We got on the highway, and first of all, it wasn't plowed. At all. Then, we get about twenty minutes into it, and guess what. ANOTHER whiteout. Even in the daytime. There was this semi truck, that we were following, and all of the sudden about twenty feet in front of us, it disappeared into the white. We couldn't see it. I mean, it was there, but you had no idea where. We went about five miles an hour, but you have no idea what's ahead of you. And neither do the people behind you. And again, there's nothing you can do but just go slow and try to stave off a full-fledged anxiety attack. Getting off at that point would have been more dangerous b/c you couldn't see the ramps.
As we started to come out of it, it was beautiful in its own way, but it just looked positively apocalyptic. The sun came out, and the snow was being blown across the highway. It looked like how you might picture a nuclear fallout to look. Eerie, silver and wild.
There were some accidents apparently on the other side of the highway, but thankfully no fatalities or even serious injuries from all reports. Everyone was going slow and using their brains (outside of being stupid enough to get stuck in it in the first place.)
So, I just wish to express my thanks to all of our guardian angels, and my wonderful talented husband... and now I am off to find some more advil and nurse this newly developed traffic ulcer.
However, having been an ungraceful flatlander my entire life, and being deathly afraid of heights (think escalators), not particularly liking cold or snow, and never having been on skis or a snowboard...this was definitely unnatural.
I bought my first pair of snowpants and skijacket ($22 down from $160!) and we all got a private lesson with the fetching (albeit) 22 year old Tex. Then it was onto the slopes. Um...I should start by saying. I didn't understand the lesson, except the falling bit. I learned how to fall REALLY well. Brendan and Jennifer both did very well. Brendan had it down about fifteen minutes into it. I'm jealous. And, Jen definitely got the hang of it faster, although had a couple of pretty hard falls that I'm sure she is feeling today.
I was particularly terrible at getting off the ski lift where they expected you to be able to actually snowboard down a four foot embankment without running into the people standing five feet away. High hopes, sad reality. I solved the running-into-people-issue by gracefully eating it in new and delightfully uncoordinated ways about two feet off the lift each and every time.
And, I also have to say that I am now currently in more pain than I was after the marathon AND the broken kneecap combined. I've been eating advil like skittles, and last night when I tried to roll over when I was sleeping, the pain woke me up and the...we'll call them "muscles"... in my shoulder and arms were so tight that I was only able to move in tiny fractional increments until I finally found myself in a sort of non-excruciating position.
That said...I would totally go again. It was fun.
What wasn't fun was the drive home. Getting to this area of Michigan means driving on two lane rural highways the entire time. It was dark when we left, and it started out fine, but about halfway there, we hit a genuine, oh-my-god-this-is-a-blizzard, blizzard. It was a full-fledged white out, and there are absolutely no streetlights on these roads to help give definition to the road ahead of you, nor is there consistent traffic enough to leave you snow tracks, so basically we couldn't see ten feet in front of the car. Hazards flashing, we had no choice but to keep going at about five miles an hour.
The only time you knew you were still on the road was from sporadic reflective signs and when other cars were coming toward you, because their headlights helped you see. It was very very scary. The problem is, you can't just stop. You have no idea where you are, and there aren't any houses nearby or even roads to pull off into. And if you pull onto the shoulder, someone might not see you and could clobber you. So, basically, I spent the entire time watching the shoulder just to make sure that we weren't veering off. It was the worst in all my years of driving in the snow in MI that I have ever experienced.
The weather reports had said no snow was supposed to happen until eleven o'clock at night. Unfortunately, Nature, she is her own woman.
But, Brendan did an excellent wonderful exceptional job of driving, and when we finally got about fifteen miles from home, it cleared up and there was no snow at all at our house in New Buffalo. So weird. It was like we imagined it.
Then, the next day we woke up, and snow HAD hit New Buffalo, so we looked on the radar to see where the snow was falling, and it was coming down in a straight line all the way down the lake through a strip of our drive through Indiana, but we figured if we stayed on the highway, we would be fine. And at least it was daytime.
No. We got on the highway, and first of all, it wasn't plowed. At all. Then, we get about twenty minutes into it, and guess what. ANOTHER whiteout. Even in the daytime. There was this semi truck, that we were following, and all of the sudden about twenty feet in front of us, it disappeared into the white. We couldn't see it. I mean, it was there, but you had no idea where. We went about five miles an hour, but you have no idea what's ahead of you. And neither do the people behind you. And again, there's nothing you can do but just go slow and try to stave off a full-fledged anxiety attack. Getting off at that point would have been more dangerous b/c you couldn't see the ramps.
As we started to come out of it, it was beautiful in its own way, but it just looked positively apocalyptic. The sun came out, and the snow was being blown across the highway. It looked like how you might picture a nuclear fallout to look. Eerie, silver and wild.
There were some accidents apparently on the other side of the highway, but thankfully no fatalities or even serious injuries from all reports. Everyone was going slow and using their brains (outside of being stupid enough to get stuck in it in the first place.)
So, I just wish to express my thanks to all of our guardian angels, and my wonderful talented husband... and now I am off to find some more advil and nurse this newly developed traffic ulcer.
posted by Heather Gately at 8:20 AM
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