Ohio Winters, by Louise Annarino, January 18,2014

When I first moved from Columbus to S.E. Ohio I was entranced by the feel of wilderness encroaching the city limits. I moved into a solar home, newly built into the side of a hill, off a backwoods area dirt road north of Pomeroy. I soon learned that half-hour drives to work in a metro area differed greatly from a half-hour drives to work in rural Ohio. Logging trucks, escaped cattle, roaming wild pigs, and turkey vultures scavenging road kill delayed the trip considerably; snow and ice even more.

I love Ohio and its winter storms, snow piling in drifts against the door, the clean sunny days which often follow snowstorms. The winter evening I could not drive my car up the gravel driveway to my home and slid from one ditch to another, barely staying on track nearly changed my mind. Realizing the incline was simply too steep for my TC3, I decided to use my neighbors’ driveway which had a more gentle upward slope.  Once I reached the end of their drive, I could try the tractor track which connected our two properties through the woods. It was narrow but passable. It was the track we used to walk the two mile trek between our houses for neighborly visits.

The track was icy but flat; and, the four inches of snow atop the ice allowed for better traction. All went well until my tires became stuck when the ice broke under the car’s weight. Revving into reverse then forward only sank the tires deeper into the mud. I opened the door, stepped out and broke through more ice into a six inch deep mud puddle filled with icy water. My only choice was to hike the next mile home through ice water and mud, never knowing when the snow underfoot would give way. By the time I got home I was a sodden ice cube of muddy woman. The tears from my laughter over such a ridiculous effort had frozen on my cheeks. I smiled all through the hot shower and hot cocoa afterwards, tucked up under a warm blanket before the calming fire in my Jotul wood stove.

Eventually, I called for help. A tractor would come the next afternoon to pull out my car. I had time to reconsider my love of Ohio winters, since I could not get to work the next day. I decided I still loved them as I watched the snow continue to drift and blow. It was magical. Snow covered every muddy hole, every piece of thin ice, every mistake of human nature, every stupid idea and silly effort to control the natural world. Snow gives us a chance to reconnoiter our personal terrain of mind and soul. It strengthens our will and gladdens our hearts.

I remembered my solo midnight skate on a frozen farm pond near an abandoned homestead down the lane across from my home under a full moon; the feeling of gliding through life with grace and enchantment stirring my senses, a sense of overwhelming peace and safety. I remembered the late night I walked through the woods after a dinner party at my neighbors’ home, a flashlight on high beam held tightfisted until I realized the moon was full and the flashlight was not needed. It was only when I turned it off that the beauty of the night was fully revealed and my hand relaxed. Another walk home through the woods on a cold winter’s night was a walk though a crystal wonderland,every branch and twig of the trees and bushes, and each broken leaf of the ground-cover bathed in frozen ice. The moon broke the ice into rainbows of color and shimmered a stream of beauty with each step I took. A journey which normally took half an hour took two hours as I slowly made my way through a magical kingdom of crystal light. I felt blessed by the greater power of the universe.

Such memories of Ohio’s snow and ice intrude as I make my way down icy streets to the grocery store, inching my way over salt-covered parking lots, picking myself up after my feet slide out from under me on black ice. I still love every minute of winter, still laugh when I fall, still smile when I slow the car to avoid a slide, still sigh when I catch snowflakes on my tongue and still revel in my arrival home to a warm apartment.

My Pomeroy neighbors, Connecticut born and bred, once told me that S.E. Ohio was poor because early settlers who decided to remain in the hills to farm rather than brave the rivers and trails to rich farmland farther west were “lazy, weak and ignorant”,implying their poverty was well-deserved. Since most farming at the earlier time was horse-driven, the hills posed no obstacle to success. It was neither unwise, nor cowardly to make the decision to stay among the beautiful and fertile hills where nature’s magic so easily revealed itself. It was not a lack of courage which held them, but a faith in themselves which did so. It is easy to see now,looking back, that mechanization would destroy their ability to compete using horses because tractors and combines cannot handle steep hillsides; but, less so that corporate farming would supplant the small farmer. It is interesting that small farmers in S.E. Ohio are supplying much of the organic plants, produce and dairy we see in our groceries today. Snowville Creamery is a particularly apt example, and well-named.

We Ohioans love Ohio for many reasons, not the least of which is our cold, icy and snowy winters. We appreciate how our snow season slows life so that we may dream and remember. There are many ways to think about Ohio, about Ohioans, about winter. I happen to believe settlers who chose to remain in Ohio made the right choice, the smart choice, the memorable and magical choice. If too many Ohioans live in poverty it is not from lack of imagination, lack of willingness to work hard, nor lack of courage. It is not a winter of the soul of those in  poverty which we should question; but rather, the winter of the soul’s imagination of those who decide who will be poor while hoarding their own riches, which we should question.