"You comin'?"
"I guess," I croaked back at my husband through the receiver.
"I'll be down there in 10 or 15 minutes. Be ready."
The girls were at their grandparents'. We had gotten a few inches of sleet and snow overnight, and it was still coming down. I was going to get to ride with my husband while he plowed and sanded his town route, although at 5:00 in the morning I wasn't as eager as I had been twelve hours earlier. But since he'd been up for three hours already, I couldn't complain. I hopped out of bed, threw yesterday's sweater and jeans on, and headed for the kitchen with the dog. I put the kettle on the stove, let Deacon in and out and fed him; sliced some bread and made a PB&J for a breakfast to go; grabbed a banana, my cell, my mug, and my camera too; donned a hat, my boots, and coat; and after receiving another impatient phone call, ran out the door and down the driveway. No lights were on at the neighbor's. The snow was thick and crunchy, so I didn't have to worry about slipping, even in the dark. The air was crisp, and the snow whispered against my face and neck.
The behemoth green dump truck waited for me down at the road, growling, lights flashing seemingly from every angle of it. I went around to the passenger side, reached up to open the door, threw my sandwich and banana up into the seat, and climbed into the cab via the arms of the plow wing. I took my coat off, buckled, and settled in.
We made our way up the hill in silence, and when he finally spoke he said that in the village earlier he had had to wait for a skunk to cross the road, that he could smell it from Frazers all the way up onto the Quechee Road. We haven't had that much snow at all this winter and just came out of a particularly springy week, full of mud and sunshine. "It was pissy...its balls were probably draggin' in the snow." My husband has a colorful repertoire, especially on four hours of sleep.
Most of the other vehicles we met on the road were personal plow trucks. The radio was quiet too, except for the occasional state or town worker coming on to check in with the others. But when they did speak it was so loud I had to turn my head to shield my ears. No wonder he's losing his hearing.
I'm bounced around in my seat, cradling my licorice-mint tea while he tends to business. The huge dash is full of buttons and gauges. Within the 2- or 3-foot span between our seats is a line of 6 levers which control the two plows (front and side), the tailgate, and something else I can't remember. To the left of those is a box with two dials and a push-lever on it, which controls the sander. And then there's the long shifting lever in front of the sander box. Sometimes he has his hands on the steering wheel and two of these other things at once. I contemplate why he can't multitask like this at home (perhaps I need to put a strobe light and some knobs on top of the trash bin so he'll remember to take it out). The truck itself is tall; the bottom of the cab where I had climbed in earlier is at about chest level. The front plow is about 4 feet tall. There's a constant low whine of the engine and other rumbling of mechanics taking place around us; there are chains rattling; and of course there's the scraping of the the plows against dirt, rocks, and pavement. With every irregularity in the road or when he pushes into a snow bank at an intersection, we get thrashed and bounced. It's a big cage of testosterone on giant wheels, really. Which, I suppose, is what caused this girl to get out of bed and run down her driveway in the dark at 5:30 AM. It's good to see him in his element.
But there are other reasons I like this particular ride too. It's sort of therapeutic...to look out my window at the snow shooting off the wing, the lights strobing, the trees whizzing by. He says I talk even less than usual when I get in this truck. And our daughters are the same way. There's just so much going on, it's easy to get lost in thought. But in the breaks of contemplating the universe, we chat about whose tap lines are whose...the GI bug of a coworker last week that went through him like "wildfire"...the logging of a parcel of land. I roll down my window and push the mirror in or out on request, as it apparently gets rocked out of place. It's still dark, but there are lights starting to come on in the houses we pass.
After an hour I'm rubbing my eyes, wishing I had remembered my glasses. The sky is starting to lighten. A few more cars are on the road.
It's really a beautiful time, with the new blanket of white over everything, a photographer's dream (had the ride not been so bumpy and the pictures not so blurry). Everywhere I look is a would-be beautiful shot...a majestic barn, an extra-still and silent cemetery, the sun and blue sky trying their best to break through gray clouds.
Back in the village we fuel up at the town garage, and stop in at the store for an English muffin and beverages for the driver. We plow on through hour 2. There's a trailer wherein lives an old friend who we can see drinking coffee in his kitchen. We give a long honk, and he cranes his neck and waves cheerfully at us.
The bouncing in the cab continues. The driver notes "this would be more fun if you weren't wearing a bra." Fun for him, sure. He gets the seat with the suspension in it. I'm not about to put any more of my body parts at the mercy of this ride. I'm already rubbing my neck, my back is starting to protest and dream of yoga positions, and my knees - which put on a few extra miles of running this week - are begging to be straightened.
At hour 3 the sun is shining brightly here and there, now and again, and people are out with their dogs on leashes. We stop at the garage again, this time to take the front plow and tire chains off. My husband has kin with a rubbish business who are parked in the lot, collecting from their Saturday-morning customers. I chat with them while husband wrestles with his metal beast. It's good to stretch my legs and feel the wind.
Our next stop is the sand pile. While the guys take turns running the loader and filling up their trucks, I doodle, jot some notes, and finish my tea.
And we move on. I have to get back home to do 4 or 5 hours of my own work soon. I enjoy the last few miles of sunshine and scenery.
Back on our own hill, we take a left turn onto what probably shouldn't be a town-maintained road, as it's really just a driveway. But an elderly couple lives there, along with some of their children who have recently built and/or inherited houses along the drive too. This family once owned most of the hill we all live on, and the couple is endeared to the neighborhood. A day or two before, the wife passed away...two months after her husband died, just before Christmas.
"I usually turn around here..." my husband says as we pass their barn...but he continues on up the long driveway, right to the elderly couple's doorstep. He's colorful; but he's a good, sweet man.
He drops me off at the bottom of the driveway with a kiss, where my adventure began 4 hours ago. He still has most of his route to sand. By late morning, he'll have been in his truck 8-1/2 hours, put on 116 miles of mostly dirt road, and spread four dump truck loads of sand and salt. I hope wherever you traveled today, you got there safely.
So, welcome newborn snow. Enjoy your brief end-of-February stay in our town. Thank you for giving my husband some overtime....and thank you for enriching our landscape with such a colorless backdrop that the beauty of our fields, fences, branches, and streams can boast their simplistic splendor.
