I'm watching out the window tonight as the snow piles up outside here in southern Wisconsin and I am thinking of the people a hundred years ago that didn't have the benefit of the internet or the Weather Channel to watch the blow by blow account of the misery that has been dealt out to them. Did we come from the same place they did? How did we get so wimpy?
They got up in the morning and split wood and milked cows and carried on. The kids went to school and Mom made dinner on the wood stove. Things were different then.
I talked to an old friend in Birmingham tonight and I told her that I just wanted to be as prepared for such an event as my grandparents were. They would have had plenty of food on hand to deal with such an occurrence and it would have been written off as "just a bad stretch of weather."
The local mantra tonight is "Travel is not advised." People still feel like they have to go out in this weather. They feel like somebody will take care of them.
Stay home. Why do we think it is imperative to defy Nature?
Let this storm pass and be content with what you have at home. Don't feel so self important as to have the need to overpower nature tonight. Let it be.
We're watching as the storm flies over us and we're seeing the drifts pile up. The woodstove is keeping us warm and tomorrow is going to bring a lot of shoveling. That's OK, it's Wisconsin, after all.
We won't be going to PASA in Pennsylvania this week with Earth Tools. The weather just didn't cooperate. I'm sorry that we won't get a chance to meet some new customers. Sometimes you just have to accept the fact that our environment owns us. It's time to learn to accept that fact.
Good soil to you,
Gulland
Great post Gulland, I'm trying to learn the lessons of our forefathers (not mine personally, the UK isn't known for such brutal weather) and teach them to my kids before they have a chance to be softened by this heavily-cushioned world.
ReplyDeleteThanks, my friend. I think the cushioning has grown a bit thinner lately for most people, but the habits have been there for so long that we try to keep on with business as usual at any cost.
ReplyDeleteI have a date with a snow shovel and a foot of fresh snow. It's a shame I can't just leave it there until April!
Even I am amazed at the amount of whining going on in Chicago over this. People here really expect someone to wipe their little bottoms for them.
ReplyDeleteIn our condo building there were all of 2 people who shoveled out the building...guess who was one of them? The rest of them here always seem to disappear when actual work has to be done.
Guess which ones will not be eating out of my preps if TSHTF and I'm still living here?
John, In watching the news and seeing people walking around Chicago and other cities in the various stricken areas, I was a little surprised to see so many people in 'business' attire; hatless, bootless. Maybe you have to look a certain way in the big cities, but it's The Storm of the Century, for goodness sakes!
ReplyDeleteI was just outside repairing our mailbox at 8 degrees with a 15-20 mph wind. (Snow plows are tough on mailboxes up here) It took about an hour and a half to reconstruct it and it was windy, but sunny. I can't say I was totally warm, but I got the job done and didn't suffer because I was dressed for it. I can't imagine abandoning my car on Lakeshore Drive in Chicago and setting out on foot wearing business clothes, but apparently people did. This MAXIMEGABLIZZARD wasn't a big secret, was it?