That's probably because I'm so comfortable using a shovel. For the first thirteen winters we spent in New Brunswick, I mucked barn stalls almost daily. We always had at least six horses (and as many, though never more, than nine). If each horse ate 25 lbs of dry hay daily, with the water they need to digest it weighing at least twice as much, it is no exaggeration to say that I moved, on average, hundreds of pounds of hay every day. With a shovel and wheelbarrow. And if I was forced to skip a day or two, on some weekends I moved a ton.
So, for me, it's not such a big deal to clean my own driveway, sidewalks and decks after every snowstorm, and I look forward to it.
Quite honestly, I'm pretty sick of hearing the advice (if well-meaning) of those who tell me that a snow-shovel is a "widow-maker".
If they find me dead of a massive coronary some morning (we got about 10cm last night), hey ... I'm perfectly ok with that. There are so many ways of dying that are far worse, and far more likely.
Of all the ways to die, face down in snow is certainly not the worst.
At age 62, having seen how time wilts and withers people, how cancer chews up their bodies, how dementia wears down families, a simple cardiac arrest isn't such a bad prospect.
A few photos I took this morning:
