I am sick and tired of this winter. It is still February and I have had it up to the gills. Weather these days in this rock within the sea sucks. While I was born and raised here, I’m not one to rail on about how dreadful things were back in those days and how the weather was much worse that it is now. Not so. This is the worst. This winter is crippling.

Part of the problem is that I am a townie who has been living out here in the country for half a century. It’s only in the woods up around Three Island Pond in Paradise and that is not exactly the Gaff Topsails, but it is beyond the comfort of the civilization of St. John’s. No municipal water up here. No sewerage system. You are on your own in the forest. To walk to a store from here to get a few beers or a block of butter is three kilometres each way. I did it once on a summer’s day about 15 years ago when my car wouldn’t start and my tongue was hanging out for a cold beer.

The truth is I hate Winter. It is horrible. I’m saying that although we had no real snow until January 2026 this year but God, we have it now. I was snowed in for two days this month. Winter in the country is really about trying to get by and stay warm and I’m “bet out” as the corner boys in St. John’s say.

I have in my possession now a snow blower, three shovels and a scoop. I have bags of salt, a couple of hammers, and a 12-pound mall. That’s because the roof in two different parts of my home doesn’t have a steep enough pitch on it. With every storm I take to the air when snow builds up on the roof. It HAS to be done or you’ll get an ice dam. I have swung around on an aluminium ladder in howling gales up there. It’s like some sort of weird circus aerial act. Luckily, those parts of the roof are only 12 feet or so off the ground. I also have two of those ice-melting cords that you plug into a socket to melt any ice dams that will occur. Those melt wires drive the little wheel around in the electric meter really quick.

That’s what I do out here in the woods. I try to keep the house warm and dry and safe. I shovel snow. I climb ladders. I melt snow. I have a snow rake that I got as a Christmas gift, which is excellent for hauling snow off the roof. I chop wood and I keep the stove in the basement lit. Apart from the wood chopping, which has “a Zen thing” attached to it, I hate it all. I’m SICK of it. Wet boots, wet mitts, wet socks and sweating like a bull every day are all part of a litany of what’s wrong with Winter here.

Hurry Spring. I want to see the 10-foot-high snowbanks on my road melt away. I want to see all the remnants of dogs from those people that walk their dogs around here show up again. I won’t mind. I WANT to see all those flyers that never quite made it to our door but got thrown into the driveway and were then covered up by snow. I’ll welcome them if even they are all about Christmas lights and specials on pails of salt beef now long gone. I’ll say hello and words of welcome as well to my nine iron, my putter, and 30 golf balls which are out there somewhere on my front property. I want to visit them again because I’ll know then that I’ve finally seen the back end of this ugly Winter.

I still remember all the big storms of my youth, the big sleet storms in the 1950s that shut everything down. We lost power for days and cooked in the fireplace. I have seen the pictures of snow piled up to the edge of roofs on houses, but that was more an issue of snow removal in those than actual tonnage on the ground. These days are worse.

We should confess now in terms of news we have done a full skiff and dory load of weather stories over the years. How cold it was, how hot it was, how windy it was, how much rain we have had, how little rain we have had. That’s all part of the world of news. Nobody in the history of news ever went broke from putting the fear of God into people about what might happen in the next 72 hours.

A couple of hurricanes and a few droughts have been part of our weather past in recent days. There have been extremes. I played tennis in Bowring Park one Valentine’s weekend and I got stranded in the snow with my son on Topsail Hill in a day that was mid-October. All of that notwithstanding the weather in those days never got me down like the current evil hand being dealt to us. Snow, snow, and more snow in the forecast. I am sick of shovelling. I am tired putting sheer pins in my snow blower and tired of making sure I have enough premium gas out in my shed.

Two of my neighbours who are senior citizens leave this Newfoundland in October and go to Florida and live in a trailer until April. I’m not at that stage yet but I’m thinking about it.

You can contact Jim Furlong at jfurlong@ntv.ca