A fine how do you do from Old Man Winter

"Maine is a joy in the summer. But the soul of Maine is more apparent in the winter." 

Paul Theroux

 AUBURN — Winter left its calling card two days before the new year arrived.

Old Man Winter wanted to assure residents of New England that he was still in the neighborhood and doesn’t like to be forgotten.

The weather guys and gals got this wrong again, but that is nothing new when it comes to Maine’s fickle forecasters.

Of course, weather reports varied just like Trump’s inane Tweets. We were on the receiving end of 19 whopping inches of snow in western Maine. It took 15 minutes with two guys (me and my son) manning  shovels to clear the walkway to the street.

It is miserable, heavy snow that puts your heart through a stress test.

But, and I hate to say this, we needed the white stuff after a summer drought that I had never witnessed in my lifetime.

For the morons who don’t believe in global warming, it was the hottest year ever on the planet, and if we continue to treat the globe like a toilet, watch Florida disappear thanks to rising tides due to a melting polar ice cap. I can’t fix stupid and I fear for the environment when an uninformed and inept presidency is sworn in at the White House on Jan. 20.

China is creating 10 miles of desert each year because of its neglect of its natural resources. You have to ask yourself what is the sense of being an economic powerhouse if a nation can’t drink its water due to rampant pollution. I guess having a fat wallet can justify ignorance.

Anyway, enjoy the snow and Old Man Winter’s chilly touch as we head into another year.

Walking for a cure and my father

“It has been said, 'time heals all wounds.' I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.” 

― Rose Kennedy

LEWISTON — We took a long walk for a good cause on a chilly Sunday morning.

A couple of hundred people tagged along to raise money for “The Long Goodbye,” also know as Alzheimer’s — the devastating disease of the brain.

It is the scourge of the elderly and the bastard killed my father. For me, this murderer is the enemy of the state and needs to be put down with a powerful drug. The medical community has declared war on this SOB, but so far, there is no cure or a way to slow its progression despite all the research.

For four years, I was helpless as Albert John Blasi’s mind faded away. He raised four good kids, and was a compassionate teacher and coach. He succumbed to Alzheimer's on on Nov. 8, 2014. Those last hours of his life were enough to trigger depression in all of us.

So my wife and I walked through New Auburn and along the the Androscoggin River as a chilly autumn wind gave us a head’s-up that winter would be making a return engagement in the Pine Tree State. We walked with people who either lost a loved one to the disease or were in the midst of taking care of a stricken family member.

There’s not much you can do when Alzheimer’s targets a loved one. You experience the horrible pain as a loved one slowly disappears into the night. There is no cure for this malevolent killer, which robs victims of their cherished memories.

Alzheimer’s, like every killer disease, is simply cruel. I watched my father struggle to remember or speak and eventually he forgot how to eat — and there is not damn thing I could do except watch him die.

So we walked, talked and traded memories of my father during our three-mile trek. Terri and I had insightful conversations about Big Al. I thought him with each step I took and found the grief still lingers and impossible to shake.

We donated money, listen to people speak about loved ones battling the disease and then followed the course mapped out by dedicated volunteers. Donors were given flower pinwheels and were planted in the park.

But instead of being consumed by depression, we decided to take active steps to do something — anything — about this mind robber.

Sometimes, you think all the fundraising and goodwill are just futile attempts to stamp out the disease and make us feel good. But once you get involved, you feel like you are taking evasive action and no longer a bystander watching the suffering.

Participating in fundraising events might help families avoid this long ordeal, but time is of the essence for all those slipping away.

So open your wallets, take a long walk with caring people and go the distance for a cure for Alzheimer’s. Being involved is one way to battle grief, helplessness and an opportunity to eliminate this disease.

A photo warms the heart during a brutal winter

Print copy by Globe photographer Jim O'Brien
 Umpire Mike Caira listens politely as Revere coach Al Blasi dramatizes his claim that Arlington’s Ron Valeri was out trying to steal third base during yesterday’s game. Blasi lost the argument and Revere lost the game, 2-1. This copy of the photo appeared on the front page of the sports section of the Boston Evening Globe dated Thursday, April 27, 1978.

“It's so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone.” 

                               
                                                                        ― John Steinbeck, The Winter of Our Discontent

AUBURN, Maine — Whenever I open the shades and peer through the window, blinding snow and howling winds obscure my vision of a disappearing landscape that lies beneath 100 inches of god damn snow.

I can’t speak for all New Englanders, but this has certainly been the winter of my discontent and February has been a complete whiteout. Weekly snowstorms drift in and I feel like I have been carpet bombed by Mother Nature.

Obscenities litter my white front lawn. A line of six-foot high hedges, which act as a barrier to outside world, are buried under seven feet of snow. Their branches protrude through the white powder, crying out for help. Trenches surround my home, making my yard look like the Battle of the Marne during World War I. I am expecting a sniper to take a shot at me as I burrow through snow to get to the oil pipe or the porch.

I feel like a freakin’ groundhog.

I have given up on shoveling my other driveway. The remains of a broken shovel rests against a wall on my deck in the freezing cold. It was good shovel that has become another casualty in the war against snow. I will miss it.

Old Man Winter has been merciless to this region of America. There has been talk that people on the West Coast are frustrated because the Northeast is hogging all the snow.

Really!

I have a few choice words for my fellow Americans in Washington and Oregon. So what’s stopping them from showing up in my neighborhood with huge dump trucks to haul away this white crap.

I don’t wear snowshoes and don’t enjoy trudging through six feet of snow. I remain huddled inside and have gone on a cleaning spree — again.

I have been going through my parents’ personal items since my father’s death last November. I feel like a ghoul as we divide up their belongings. I would do anything to avoid this grisly task.

My father would have despised this winter. He was the Revere High School baseball coach for 42 years. Spring and summer were his favorite seasons. Baseball was his thing and you can’t play America’s pastime in the snow. I can still hear him cuss with each shovel of snow. He hated the stuff.

My mother, who passed four years ago, kept all the clippings of his coaching career. This basket of hard copies from my past is a treasure trove to a son who was the team’s bat boy and had the opportunity to hang out with his dad on the diamond as a child.

As I sifted through the clips as another storm set down a new coat of — you guessed it — fresh snow, I discovered a copy of the photo and clipping that "Boston Globe" reporter Marvin Pave and I were hoping to find to run with a well-written feature story about my dad’s life that appeared last November in Boston’s largest daily. It was a remarkable tribute to a good man who gave a damn about the right things in life.

I pulled the front page of the "Boston Globe Evening’s" sports section dated Thursday, April 27, 1978 from the pile of clippings. My loving mother had saved the faded newspaper all these years.

Globe photographer Frank O’Brien took the photo of my father having words with an umpire during a Revere baseball game against the Arlington Spyponders. It was a banner photo of my dad coming to bat for his team.

The next day at Revere High School a couple of teachers called me into the history department’s room and pointed out the photo of my father. We all had a laugh. My father was amused and quite popular for a few days.

I have a print of the black-and-white photo. It was given to me by my sisters and apparently purchased by my mother nearly 36 years ago. These possessions have  become precious artifacts of my past.

Finding that photo of my father and the old sports front of the Boston Evening Globe made a winter’s gloomy day bearable to a son who still wishes he could spend one more hour on a baseball diamond with his father.

Ice, ice baby

“Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire: it is the time for home.” ― Edith Sitwell

“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.” 
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America

AUBURN, Maine — Those demented souls, who are still holding out for a white Christmas or want to go walking in a  winter wonderland should visit the Pine Tree State, which is now freeze-dried thanks to a three-day ice storm which has pulled the plug on 100 hundred towns across the state. 

There is nearly an inch of ice on wilting limbs, and we all know how that goes — badly. 

If you want to take your chances on I-95 and don't mind bouncing off guard rails as you slide up the interstate, bring your skates or a dog sled. Everything has been coated with dangerous, solid ice. You can take in spectacular views of trees bowing to Mother Nature and electrical fires as limbs come crashing down on droopy wires. For more spectacular views, you might see transformers bursting like the rockets red glare and witness neighborhoods descend into darkness.

The police scanner is alive with mayhem. Numerous reports of limbs and downed wires are keeping police and fire departments rushing through the snow on eight-cylinder cruisers. There is no rest for weary Central Maine Power crews who have the nerve to repair power lines in the cold, damp dark.

Right now, there are 30,000 of us sitting in the cold dark and shouting obscenities that can be heard for miles around central Maine. A passing Central Maine Power truck brings us to the window and hope. The F-word is the  adjective of the day. Sentences contain three or four of the most reviled word in obscenity's lexicon. We have been stuck indoors for nearly 48 hours as we tend to our wood stoves and generators. 

You take your life into your own hands when you walk to the car or go shopping. My walkway is a miniature ice rink without a Zamboni.

If you are driving, keep an eye for downed wires and remember no power line is safe to touch — ever! Central Maine Power has been reminding Mainers of the dangers of touching a power line for years. 

No kidding! Thanks for the tip!

I am witnessing my second ice storm in the Pine Tree State. In 1998, the rented house I was living in went dark for nearly five days. This family of three was offered a place to stay in front of a warm fireplace at a friend's home for the night. We woke up early and returned to our house, which now resembled an igloo surrounded by sheets of ice.

My son was two years old, and I wasn't about to risk his health. It was time to retreat and live to fight another day with my shovel and rock salt.

That's when we decided to abandon the place and headed down a dangerous I-95. We were like refugees as we fled the cold and ice. My mother, who is no longer alive, opened the door that morning. Her jaw dropped and her eyes nearly popped out her head when she saw us on her doorstep. This family of three was seeking warmth and a hot meal.

That night, I was called back up to Maine to put out the Sun Journal. For the first time in the paper's history, we could not get the newspaper out the night before when the ice storm got its icy hands around the Pine Tree State.

In just 18 hours, I traveled back and forth to Maine to get the edition out on the streets, logging some 470 miles. 

Two days later, the landlord had the rented house up and running with generator. There was heat in the building.

Today, the ice storm of 2013 is like '98's kid brother. It isn't spectacular and we have only lost power three times for about three hours. It is not a bust, though. The city of Bangor might not get power back for nearly a week.

We have been lucky in the Lewiston-Auburn area. Let's just hope Santa won't slide off a roof and hita tree during each rooftop landing. I hate to see the cherubic fellow injure himself on that special night.

The lights are on at my home in Auburn, but all that could change with the drop of a limb.

Cold heart

AUBURN, Maine - For those of you who have watched from afar, the good people of New England have been freezing their buns off for the past six days.

If you live in a warm-weather state or are enjoying summer down under in Australia, then you can smile all you want because, baby, it's damn cold up here.

Winter is slapping New Englanders around for the moment. We are wearing 40 layers of clothing and saying prayers when we start our cars.

Car-battery killing winds have swept across Maine and turned this climate into a frozen tundra. The f-word can be heard from miles away when Mainers turn over their stubborn cars in below-zero morning cold. 

For six mind-numbing days, the cold has taken our breaths away and made oil companies rich. And even on the seventh day, the Arctic cold did not rest, leaving Mainers longing for humidity and 80-degree temperatures.

The steam rising from Casco Bay harbor in Portland was a site to behold. Slip, sliding away on my walkway will put a snicker on anyone's face.

A cold snap is not a rare occurrence in the six-state region. Winters are more famous than Gov. Paul LePage's outbursts in the Pine Tree State. Laborers make a living off the white stuff and bone-chilling temperatures.

A good deal of Maine's economy thrives on winter. The ski industry lives and dies with snowfall amounts. Snowmobiliers need a strong snow pack to race their loud half tracks on miles of trails through the backwoods of Maine.

Without snow and this tricky climate, well, Maine wouldn't be Maine.

But the Arctic air mass has modified, and on Saturday, it reached 20 degrees, making me wonder if I could slip in an afternoon swim at Popham Beach. By Tuesday, New England is looking at temps in the 30s - a heatwave for all of us wearing long underwear.

My son is a ski patrol candidate at Lost Valley. For seven hours, Anthony, an all-weather kid who loves the Great Outdoors, patrolled the slopes, making sure Lost Valley was safe for democracy in frigid temperatures.

As I proudly watched Anthony meander down the course to make sure all skiers were safely down off the mountain before it closed, it's didn't seem so cold outside anymore.

Woodstock

Cut-and-dried wood awaits to be stacked

AUBURN, Maine — For those of you who swing a maul, wield an axe or mastered the use of a dangerous gas-powered chainsaw for a living, I have nothing but respect for all woodsmen, arborists, landscapers and the average Joe who heats his home in the winter with wood.

Making another delivery

I also depend on wood to keep warm during Maine's ferocious winters. Heating your home with wood is hard work and right up there with digging ditches, but the last thing I want to do is hand over more money to greedy gas and oil companies, which delight in robbing its customers.

Making use of the sawdust

I understand there are risks when it comes to heating with wood, and there is the feeling of guilt to being a contributor to air pollution.

Wait, there's more!

But for many of us, fossil fuels are too expensive to use on a regular basis. My thermostat remained at a balmy 62 degrees when the wood ran out last winter. We kept our bedroom at 58 degrees and simply added more blankets as our home was transformed into an igloo after another fierce winter storm. We take six-minute showers, wash our clothes and rinse our dishes in cold water. We live like owls in the dark and turn off every light off when no one is in a room. We recycle everything, including the leaves in my backyard in the fall.

The dread of listening to our furnace bellowing in the basement as it burns oil and a hole in our wallets has forced us to lower our consumption of costly oil and rely more on our warm and fuzzy wood stove.

Last week, my next-door neighbor, Don, told me he was taking down two ash trees in his yard and generously offered me the wood free of charge. Don is one of the most easy-going souls on the planet and is a master at do-it-yourself projects. He's got talent and possesses the common sense of Thomas Paine, and I am damn lucky he lives across the street.

For the last two weeks, I lugged nearly 4,000 pounds of wood from his backyard to mine thanks to Don's heavy-duty yard cart with the big spoked wheels. This task was not for the weak at heart, someone with a bad back or an aversion to manual labor. To sweeten the deal, Don also offered me a two-year-old cord of cut-and-split wood to make room for his new storage area.

I was sold on on his offer, but I also knew this was a project that would demand a strong back. And when Dan, another outstanding neighbor, offered to lend a helping hand with the heavy stuff on a smoldering summer day, I knew I was lucky to live next to such fine men.

Back and forth I went as I delivered 200-pounds of wood in each cart. Days later, I was still trying to straighten out my 6-foot-3 frame as my back muscles became rigid and sore.

Two weeks later and my driveway is littered with ash and elm, which now has to be cut and split. I mulled buying a chainsaw, which I have never used in my life despite being an avid gardener and landscaper. But Bruce, another friend, volunteered his wood-eating chainsaw. We agreed that he would cut up the big stuff and I would handle the small fry with my trusty bow saw, which runs on human sweat. I am also using Bruce's maul until I purchase one.

Watching Bruce use his chainsaw and seeing how quickly he cut threw each large trunk was like watching a surgeon make incisions with a sharp knife. I knew I was in the presence of greatness as his chainsaw chewed up the large pieces without incident. I had a hard time keeping up as I heaved the large hunks of wood out of his way as Bruce buzzed along with his reliable and loud saw.

Now I am left with the small stuff. I am building a reliable sawhorse. Dan showed me how he constructed his sawhorse, and I thought it was a great design and sturdy enough for me to dice up the rest of the wood.

I also received some sage advice from Randy, who cut wood as young boy to help heat a house us filled with eight siblings. He shared with me his tips on splitting wood and how to handle a chainsaw. It was all good advice from a good friend.

For the next month, I will be cutting, splitting and stocking wood to keep Old Man Winter at bay and the oil companies out of my pocketbook.


I am now in the swing of things as I learn the fine art of splitting wood, and it really is an art. I am a big man with a strong back, but there is a technique to cracking open stubborn wood. Brawn and might helps when you bring the 10-pound maul down on a log, but it is always about technique, and there is nothing like watching the maul pass through a log on your first swing.

But was all this back-breaking work and sweat during the hot summer worth it?

Talk to me in January when winter has its icy paws all over Maine.

Hitting the slopes

 

"Skiing is a dance, and the mountain always leads." 

                                                                 Author Unknown

AUBURN, Maine — He's tried his hand at baseball, kicked around a soccer ball, ran track one summer, swam miles in an Olympic-size pool without drowning, but when my son slipped on a pair of skis and raced down white powdery slopes, he found another passion in the dead of winter on a wind-swept, snow-covered mountain.

Where did I go wrong!

Who would have figured my lanky 14 year old would rather barrel down the side of a frigid mountain than play catch or toss around the old pigskin with his dear-old dad.

Just what the heck happened here, anyway? He is about to become a ski bum. Fellow skiers will start calling him DUDE! I will continue to address him as Anthony even though he is joining the high-flyin' clan at Dude World.

He had to go and choose one of the most expensive outdoor sports, where snow, wind and cold wreak havoc on a soul. Paying for swimming lessons is like a drop in the bucket compared to buying a season pass and skis. I am a cash-strapped dad who will need to apply for a second mortgage on my house to pay for his need for speed on winter-whipped days. Track and swimming require shorts, sneakers and goggles. All you need for baseball is a glove, ball and bat. Soccer is easy on the wallet, too.

Most sane people remain indoors when Old Man Winter gets his dander up, but my son ignores Arctic blasts from Canada and heads up the mountain despite bone-chilling cold and falling snow. He is like "Jeremiah Johnson" and "Grizzly Adams" all rolled into one when it comes to the Great Outdoors - and I love him for his tenacity when it comes to his love of nature.

I watch from the huge windows at Lost Valley as he waves from the lift. My heart is my mouth when he takes that slow ride to the top. We both understand there is a great deal of risk that comes with gliding through the snow on a pair of skis. There is danger in this sport, and people have been injured on the slopes around the world.

I worry, but I am so damn proud of him. I believe it takes a certain amount of courage and insanity to speed down a mountain on two narrow skis. 


Just standing on skis without crashing to the ground is an accomplishment for me.

But how can I say no to an honor student who prefers books to video games and the vast wasteland of television. I would rather see him doing laps in a warm pool. Watching him whizzing around snow-packed slopes on cold winter days gives me the chills.

I know he still enjoys swimming, but skiing is now a part of his life, and I would rather see him criss-cross the slopes than have a joy stick in his lap and eyes trained on a video game. There is also a risk when a precious child spends hours in front of a computer monitor and ignores his parents and the outdoors.

I am betting the entire family will become nomads in the winter, spending a lot of time at lodges around Maine next season. But while he skis, I will be traipsing around the base of the mountain on snowshoes.

I can't let him have all the fun - and snowshoeing will help me keep my mind off my son as he traverses the snowy slopes.