A Long Cold Winter

We hit our low temperature for the winter (so far) on Jan 8 at -18degF. Tonight we may well equal or pass that.   Many nights have been below zero, many days no warmer than 10deg. A 20deg day now seems like Spring!

The lake ice is now more than a foot thick, and families walk or snow-shoe on it on sunny weekends.  About five ice-fishing huts have appeared.       Snowmobiles are now frequent visitors, tho’ they seem to be enjoying themselves less as the snow had become deeper. One extended family spends a whole day most weekends around their hut with lawn chairs, barbecue and an area cleared for the kids to skate.

There is beauty around a lake in winter,       but also days that are “white-outs.”   The morning views can be wonderful 

It has snowed, and snowed. Ground coverage is over 2 feet, but drifts are twice that deep.   The driveway now has a 5 foot bank on one side, the parking area an 8 foot pile near the street. When the wind blows hard out of the north-west, the lake is covered with “snow waves.”  The local joke is that we no longer have “snow days,” we have “no snow” days, and despite the beauty of winter, it’s fair to say we have “had enough” already!  We have probably another six weeks of this before the Spring thaw begins, and by April we shall be rejoicing in “mud season.”

We are thankful that we now have plenty of activity in the community to distract us from the weather. Our church (where we have now become members) has been busy, and Marian and I have “jobs” for the coming year. Our church’s Wednesday “Cafe” has reopened after a January break,   and we are all glad to be back there to share cake, coffee and conversation as well as music from our resident “ensemble”! A Valentines’ musical evening to raise funds for the Food Pantry squeaked in ahead of the most recent blizzard.

We’ve lost a couple of Sunday services and weekday Bible studies to snow storms, but in NH nobody stays home when a snow-fall is less than “plowable” (as the local weather service calls it!). A few of us cook a meal at the Salvation Army facility in Laconia once a month (many other church groups take turns). Next week Lake Winnipesaukee hosts sled-dog racing! So everyone keeps busy!

Marian and I have had no trips to Long Island since Thanksgiving, so we are missing our friends there, and looking forward to some Spring visits. We are half-way through a long cold winter, and hoping the pattern of storms every 4 days will soon break! A little taste of the record February warmth they’re having in the south-west US would be very welcome right about now!