"There's Talk Of A Blizzard."

Three things you should know about my father for the purposes of this post:

1) He loves to quote the movie Groundhog Day and whenever there is predicted snowfall, he will say, "There's talk of a blizzard." incessantly. I wish I could call him right now on internet speakerphone because I'm 100% positive that's how he would answer and I'd like for you to hear it.

2) He packs the car for road trips to NYC like he's traversing the Oregon Trail. Growing up, we would wait patiently in the car as he ran back to the garage numerous times for flashlights, work gloves, snowsuits (even in summer. not kidding.), atlases, tools, fire extinguishers, you name it. I can't remember a single road trip to my grandmother's house as a child that didn't involve being asked to rearrange suitcases so my father could pack extra produce to give away, multiple pair of work boots, and some oil filters. It only ever ended when my mother started screaming at him to stop and threatened to leave without him.

I'm convinced this is why I only ever travel with a carry-on. 

3) Clearing snow is an art for him. Some people enjoy watercolors. My father plows the driveway. 

Anyway, there's supposed to be a lot of snow headed our way and it reminded me of the huge snowfall over Christmas in NYC. The snow was so bad in Manhattan we were literally walking in the middle of the road because it was the only semi-clear path. In Queens, cars were buried under six feet of snow thanks to the plows. It took some people hours to dig out. When my parents came in from my grandma's house on Long Island, I worried about how long it might take my dad to find a spot, but not that he would have trouble digging out. Digging out a parking spot buried in snow is sort of the only thing he's been packing for his entire life.  

So you can imagine my shock when he arrived at Sabrina's and asked for a shovel. It was sort of like my father driving to NYC with only three tires on the car. I couldn't actually believe it. He immediately started panicking, believing that every shovel in Queens would have already been sold. Hauling off to find an open hardware store and a snow shovel, Nessa captured his success.

The way she tells it, my father jumped through the snow piles outside of the hardware store, walked into the street and yelled for Ness to take a picture of him with his shovel. Holding up traffic by extending his arm in the air, cars beeped at him as he smiled, gleefully holding his new purchase, saying, "Thank you! Thank you!" Nessa said she had to ask him to get out of the road. 

They dug out a spot in no time and my father refused to move the car until they left a few days later.

Anyway, all this talk about a big storm made me think of it. 

Buy a shovel now. Stay out of the road when you do.