A Snow Story
5 March 2006
Coming from Iowa I am no stranger to snow storms or deep snow, but even if this was my bicycle I don’t think it would do me much good to ride it to the train station today.
Since yesterday the Munich area has received approximately 50 centimeters (or about 20 inches) of snow and all public transportation apart from the underground (aka subway) has stopped running. And according to the news, yesterday and today you could/can expect 20-80 kilometer traffic jams, delayed or canceled flights, and disrupted train traffic.
A spokesman for the traffic police in Bavaria warned that those who do not absolutely have to go somewhere should stay at home and so that is exactly what A. and I have done this weekend: We left the car in the garage, watched the chaos on TV, and have periodically gone outside to play in the snow.
However, as we were trudging through the snow this morning snickering at the poor souls who dug their cars out from under the snow only to get stuck in the drift that all their digging had created, I was reminded of how when I was a kid I would get so frustrated because my parents didn’t want to brave the roads during a snow storm.
I especially thought that my mom was a wimp because at the first sign of a slippery road she would hang up her coat and tell us if we thought we needed toilet paper that badly we should just walk ourselves the eight miles into to town and get it. Of course once I got old enough to drive and after I ended up sliding into a ditch or two myself, my whole attitude about driving in the snow completely changed.
Now, as a native Midwesterner I had no choice but to learn to drive in the snow and even though I have not lived in Iowa for nearly ten years, I can still drive in the snow… even if I have to drive an ancient rear-wheel drive car.
And as a result of that “confidence,” on the day that we got a slight dusting of snow when I was in Iowa a few weeks ago I decided that I just had to run some errands. Without much thought to the snow, the small hill that my mom’s house is on, or the retaining wall kitty-corner from her house, I jumped into my 1980 rear-wheel drive Chevy Malibu with its studded tires and stepped on the gas… And promptly slid around the corner and came face to face with the retaining wall.
But like the proverbial “bike riding,” as soon as I felt the slide I remembered exactly how to steer out of it… which is why instead of hitting that wall I stopped in front of it with about an inch and a half to spare!
