It started snowing last night. The powers that be, you know them, they are the ones who sit at computer stations and punch in numbers, look up the Farmers Almanac, study the pig entrails and find woolly worm caterpillars to do the forecasts, threatened us with a 10 to 14 inch snowfall and some people at the office just laughed and said – well, we will believe it when we see it. Some people in the office thought it just might come to pass so they opted out to stay home. One man took off the rest of the day yesterday in preparation for the snow today. I received an email from Anne this morning and yes, only she and Art the Archiver showed up for work today. We are all a bunch of wimps I suppose, but I noticed something about the snow here in Maine. It is purposeful snow. That is, the snowflakes begin up in the sky in the cloud, and they pelt themselves to the earth with real purpose. Almost like they are committing suicide, and they congregate on trees, cars and any surface that will accommodate them. The various snowplows have been going up and down the road all day and one even came into the parking lot where we live. He did a really good job of plowing the snow and leaving a pile right behind the parked cars and so they would have to be shoveled out manually before they could get out. Our car was one of those. In fact, he plowed the snow beside our car and that part was not the parking lot – it was grass. We parked in the last parking space last night, and the man plowed the space next to us and took out the lawn with his plow. Ouch! I guess he thought it was paved. They will have to reseed it in the spring.
I have come to the conclusion that the term “from away” is the quintessential example of ethnocentrism. Dr. Seuss pointed out how ethnocentrism affects a community in the story, “The Star Belly Sneeches”. The staff were talking about who was born in Maine and who was ‘from away’. I looked at the group and they all looked like human beings and there seemed to be no identifying factors that would tell me who was ‘a real Mainer’ and who was ‘from away’. Art even went so far as to brand “those from Down East” as being Bostonian transplants or transients who use Wiscasset as a bedroom community for their work travel to Boston. Much like there are a group of people who make their home in Prescott, Prescott Valley, Dewey, Humbolt, Mayer, Cordes Junction or even in Sedona and Cottonwood and commute to Phoenix. One of the doctors at Mayo who treated Bill has his home in Cottonwood and he has an apartment in North Phoenix that he stays in Monday through Wednesday and is home in Cottonwood Wednesday night through Monday morning. Art the archiver refers to us as ‘flatlanders’ even though Prescott is 5500 above sea level.
In any case, we did not make the trip into the office today; We wimped out along with many of our neighbors. There are still about 12 cars in the neighboring parking lot that look like huge snowballs with wheels. A lady came out this morning and wiped off the snow with her gloved hand and then drove off. She did not even shake off the snow from her sleeves and from her coat before getting into her car and driving off. She must have been late for work and to stop and shake off the snow was going to make her even later than ever. I watched the snowplow scrape up the snow in that parking lot as well, and it surely is hard on the flora that lines the pavement. They may never recover from the assault of plow and snow. I can see why the people down the highway put hessian over their plants…..it just may provide some protection for them against the onslaught of the snowplow.
No comments:
Post a Comment