A Plethora of Winter Information

Across the Fence #320

The view out the windows, in every direction from our four-season room, is like a calendar picture. Snow clings to the pines and provides white caps to the bare branches of trees. The snow is so deep that even walking with snowshoes is a real workout.

As I sit here writing, snow is falling again. I could do without that. We have more than enough snow to last the whole winter as far as I’m concerned.

I imagine people who live in warmer climates wonder what we Northerners do all winter. I guess we sit around and talk about the weather. In my case, I write about it too, mainly because dealing with snow and cold weather occupies a lot of our time.

It seems like each time it snows, it also turns cold, bitterly cold in many cases. That’s when you put on several layers of clothes and a facemask just to go out and feed the birds. It’s not as simple as just filling the feeders when you live in the country. The wind howls and deposits huge drifts in any path that was open a few minutes earlier. I try to keep a path open to our LP tank, so Rich from Heartland Country Co-op doesn’t have to fight his way through three feet of snow to reach it. His job is tough enough in the winter. He filled it a few days ago, so we’re good for a while. Now that our fuel supply is taken care of, I’ve resorted to using my snowshoes to walk across the snow to feed the birds instead of trying to keep a path open.

I imagine some people think I should be writing about more important things than the weather, but when you live in the Frozen Tundra, weather ranks at the top of topics for discussion when people get together and talk. In days gone by, men would gather around the pot-bellied stove in a general store and discuss the weather. Now it’s hard to find a pot-bellied stove or a general store, so this column will have to do. We could talk across the fence, but the snow’s too deep along our fence-line to do much visiting there. I’ll probably get some negative feedback from people who have to work out in the snow and cold temperatures, when I talk about how nice the snow looks out our windows.

My good friend, David Giffey, is editor of the Spring Green Home News. Each week he writes a column called “Another Story.” In one of his columns he tells about an interesting discussion he had with a reader of his newspaper who was critical of things he wrote about, as well as things he didn’t write about.

He was accused of writing about trivial things, like Howard the Dog, when he should have been commenting on more important issues, namely war and body counts, specifically from the war in Afghanistan. The man had a son in Iraq at the time, and was against “Obama’s Wars.” David reminded him that the wars had been going on since 2001 when Obama was still a state senator in Illinois, and he had inherited both wars.

I found this discussion very interesting because my friend David is a Vietnam veteran, who served with the 1st Infantry Division. He knows all about war, first hand and up close. Like most of us who found ourselves involved in a war, he didn’t like what he saw and experienced either. David has been a peace activist for the 25 years I’ve known him. If there were more people with his strong convictions and courage to oppose war, perhaps this world might even experience peace one day. If you’ve driven along Highway 14 near Arena, Wisconsin on a Saturday morning and seen a man walking along the highway carrying a sign with a simple one word message, “Peace,” that’s my friend David. I hope none of the readers of this column are among the people who have thrown objects at him, shouted obscenities, or given him the one finger salute. I’m always puzzled how the word “peace” can bring out the worst in some people.

Now back to Howard the Dog that was mentioned by that man in his discussion with David. I was hoping he had named him after me, but David claims he didn’t. Darn! I think it’s a great name for a dog.

Speaking of names, in last week’s column I mention the card game “Wisk.” I meant “Whist.” I bet those of you who know your card games are wondering what Wisk is. I guess I’ll have to invent a game called Wisk now. Thanks to Matt, editor at the Jackson County Chronicle, who caught my mistake and alerted me, I was able to get the correct spelling in some papers. Maybe I can blame the Whist blunder on the weather and cold temperatures for giving me brain freeze. For those still trying to find the rules for Wisk, stay tuned. As David would say, “That’s another story.”

In this story we’ve discussed many important subjects: the weather, snow, bird feeding, LP gas, snowshoes, Obama, war, peace, signs, newspapers, dog names, card games, pot-bellied stoves, general stores, and brain freeze. Where else can you find such a plethora of information, other than visiting across the fence each week?