What I Did During the December 2010 Blizzard

I didn't think I would have work in the morning with all that snow falling from the sky, sticking to roads.

But in the back of my mind I knew that was a lie.

It was six PM and six inches of snow was stuck on the streets. Plows were hard to find walking through town, and the wind whipped snow into my lungs.

Borders was closed, and I was fine with that.

Left or right? Left is downhill and takes me back home. Left takes me to a nearby bar. Right takes me nowhere.

I stop in to have a pint. After the first, I decided to have a second. It's warm in the bar and I'm afraid that if I try to head home while it's snowing sideways I will die.

After my second, a guy starts talking to me. I've seen him at the bar before, we've talked before. He has a strange laugh. I am ready to leave, but so is he. He's also walking home, and I'm afraid that he's going to be queer if we end up leaving together. So to prevent this, I have another, but then, so does he.

I nurse my beers slowly, and so does he. It's a race to see who can last the longest on our bar stools. Finally, around 11PM he leaves and I'm drunk. I've won.

I run home drunk, shaking uncontrollably, fearing that I will freeze to death, that in the morning a plow truck will find me frozen.

As I run home, a car struggles to get up the unplowed streets. Without offering help, I run up to the car and start pushing. Like the tires, my boots slip and slide and as the car backs up, I am almost killed.

The man has a shovel, and we dig, and push, and rock, and drive, and spin, and push. We give up and park his car close to where the curb should be. He gives me five dollars. I try to refuse it, but finally say, "Ok fine, I'll take it, but because it's only five dollars, if it were any more I wouldn't take it at all." My sober subconscious wonders if that was a dick-ish thing to say.

As we walk home, a Guatemalan can't get his SUV up the hill and is digging out his tires.

"¿Cómo es usted?" I yell to the guy.

He starts speaking in Spanish, and I don't have a clue what he's saying, and then realize that I don't even know what I just said. My five dollar friend and I help our Guatemalan pal get on his way and then we walk home.

***

In the morning, with a terrible headache, I drive to work, almost crashing from unplowed streets.