Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: BACK TO BASICS (02/16/17)
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TITLE: Snow Wonder | Previous Challenge Entry
By Ann Stocking
02/23/17 -
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Cal comes in, letting the door slam. I grit my teeth.
“Wind’s picking up.”
What’s new? It’s always windy. Knee-deep in mud with dust blowing in your face.
“What are your plans for the day?” he asks.
Scrape mud off the floor, laundry, throw some chicken in the oven. Dust baseboards. Whatever.
“Nothing special. Why?”
“No reason.”
He tramps through the kitchen, fills a travel mug with coffee. “I’ll be in the garage. Turn up the furnace. It’s chilly in here.”
Go. Go fiddle with your chainsaw and carburator or whatever it is you do.
I study store flyers for sales. Rearrange the linen cupboard. Just before noon, I make a sandwich for Cal, because he’s going to come in soon.
He does, at 12:03. He shakes snow from his hat and jacket.
“It’s snowing,” he says, biting off a swatch of bread and ham.
Observant.
The snow continues, and at three, Cal comes in from his tinkering and shoves a movie into the DVD player. Rambo 10. Again.
Midst gunshots and guttural snores, I set up my sewing machine and start a baby blanket, my frenzied stitching fueled by resentment.
When the credits roll, he wakes with a grunt, stretches, and looks outside. The snow is a whirling mass, spattering the windows. It’s drifted onto the porch, and so Cal scoops out a path, but the snow falls as quickly as he shovels. “No point until the snow stops,” he says. True.
The fragrance of roasting chicken is just beginning to scent the air when the lights pulse and fade. “A tree over the line, or several, probably,” I say. The phone is dead, too.
I get out candles. We sit and stare at the flames. Waiting. All we can hear is the curious silence created by the deepening mantle of snow.
“They won’t have the lines repaired any time soon,” Cal finally says. “You want to start the woodstove while I split more wood? The house is already cooling down.”
I light the fire, grateful for Cal’s insistence that we have a woodstove in our home. Initially, I’d had misgivings about bark and smoke and ashes. I pull the half-cooked chicken out of the oven, add potatoes and carrots, and set the pot on the woodstove.
With copious thunking and thudding, Cal piles wood on the porch, then brings in an armload.
“Smells good in here, love. I’ll be back.” When he returns, he has my canner full of snow. “I know you’ll want wash water.” Of course, with no electricity, the water pump won’t work.
“Thank you.”
Ice crystals tingle on my cheek when he kisses me.
We eat chicken stew by candlelight, and snow water tea. Lying on the couch, I try to read, but I am lulled to sleep by the crackling fire and murmuring canner of water. I awaken to the sound of Cal adding wood to the stove. I’ve been tucked under an afghan.
In the morning, the power is still off. Cal stokes the fire, and I fetch pails of clean snow to make cowboy coffee, and so Cal can shave. We toast bread over the flames. I fill a stockpot with all the vegetables from the fridge. Soup for lunch and supper.
“The pioneers must have had quite a time. Laundry would have been a trial,” Cal says.
It’s not exactly thrilling now. “How about feeding animals? Getting groceries every four months?”
“Or growing food,” he added. “Not just a hobby planting some flowers or arugula.”
He knows about arugula?
“I kind of like it, though,” he says. “No ringing phone. No blaring TV.”
There’s that. No Cops or Rambo.
I complete the baby blanket, quilting it by hand, then unearth an unfinished knitting project. Cal repairs the hinges on the bathroom door, builds birdhouses from kits we bought last summer, keeps the fire going. We play Scrabble and rummy.
We talk.
About our discontents and dissatisfactions. How disdain and peevishness have crept in, as stealthily as the chill prowled through the house when the power failed.
About our desires and dreams. What we cherish. Why we love.
On the fifth morning, after Cal and I keep warm beneath the same quilt all night, the electricity surges to life.
It’s almost a disappointment.
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This is very well-written. Love it!