November blew in with a snowstorm. It began on the first Sunday of the month at 8:00 AM: beautiful, quiet, and fluffy. Madeline and Taylor took the dogs out and made a ton of cute videos of the dogs playing in their very first Vermont snow. Once they were all thoroughly chilled through, they went inside to drink hot chocolate and make plans to finally unpack the suitcases and get the owner’s quarters into livable shape.
Then it kept snowing. And snowing. And snowing some more.
“What do you think we should do?” Taylor asked.
“Hell if I know. I’ve never seen this much snow in my life.” Madeline wasn’t exaggerating. Snow was a rare occurrence in Texas, and it usually consisted of just a few inches that inevitably melted after only a couple of hours.
“There’s like – what – a foot? I wonder if we’re supposed to be getting it off the roof or something.” Taylor had voiced the concern that had been bothering Madeline all day.
The ladies realized that they had no idea what to do with snow.
“I wonder if we have a shovel?” Madeline asked no one in particular.
“Mom, we should ask Susan-she lives in Colorado, she knows about snow.”
Madeline grabbed her phone to text:
M: Hey! It’s snowing
S: You live in Vermont.
M: Um, I don’t know what to do
S: Go play outside, then drink some hot chocolate.
M: We already did that.
S: You could build a fire
M: I’m not sure if we have any wood… and I’m more worried about the practical aspects of the situation. Should I be trying to get the snow off the roof? How much can it take before it collapses? How often do y’all scrape your roof in a snowstorm?
S: Holy crap – how much snow is there?
M: Like a foot! It’s unbelievable.
S: LOL! Your house has been there for 250 years. It has seen a LOT more snow than that. Just relax. You’re such a Texan.
M: So I just do nothing?
S: You may want to see if you have a shovel to clear the snow from the porch and door, but yes – just do nothing and enjoy it! Take pictures, weirdo.
“Susan says to take pictures,” Madeline reported.
“The roof won’t collapse?” Taylor seemed very skeptical.
“She LOLed me.” Madeline was slightly annoyed with Susan’s answers to be honest. “So apparently it won’t.”
They spent the day unpacking suitcases and boxes and making plans for dividing the owner’s quarters into a more livable situation. This part of the building was originally the horse stable, connected to the main building for easy access during bad weather. A minimal effort had been made to divide the space into three “rooms” and a bathroom, but there was no kitchen and no closet space. The original 12-inch beams were still visible throughout, and the ceiling was a cozy 7-feet tall.
“We’ll have to wait to get another bed out of the POD, but maybe we can take turns on the sofabed until we dig out of here.” Madeline sat on the floor. “Which would at least cut down on the number of bodies per bed.” Madeline looked around at the piles of stuff that surrounded her. “How is it that our cleaning and organizing process has created more chaos?”
“Universal law of expansion: the contents of packed boxes expand exponentially when the seal on the box is broken.”
“You don’t need more college,” Madeline retorted. Who raised her daughter to be so snarky? Oh right. It was me…
Suddenly, the house around them began to shake and a deafening roar and then crash sent waves of vibrations and dust through the room. It was dark. Very dark. The dogs immediately started barking like the devil himself was outside, and the cats fled for their lives.
“What the hell? Was that a truck? Did it hit the house?” Madeline rushed to the window, but it was completely blocked. The roaring and crashing continued all along the front of the house. “Is it an avalanche?”
Taylor ran from the owner’s quarters to look out the front window. “Maybe there’s a cow on the roof!”
Madeline had no idea how her daughter came up with half the things she did, but she was not in the mood at the moment. “How the fuck would a cow get on the roof, Taylor?”
“It could climb up the massive pile of snow in front of the door…”
Madeline hurried to the living room and looked out the bay window. There was just enough clearance for her to see a mountain of snow blocking the door and most of the windows on that side of the house.
“Shit. It looks like it fell off the roof,” Madeline noted. “It was an avalanche.”
“Well that’s handy. One less project to worry about.”
“What’s that grey thing in the railing?” Madeline asked.
“What grey thing?
Madeline pointed at the sharp-looking, gray rectangle. “The one poking up… the one that looks like-shit-that’s a slate from the roof! The roof is falling!”
“Wow-if that hit your head it’d be a bad day.”
“Dammit. I wonder how many more are going to come down? I knew we should have raked the roof.”
“Mom, the roof is more than 40 feet tall. How the hell would we have ever raked it?”
“No clue,” Madeline said. “But now what do we do?”
They spent the next couple of hours searching for the cats and trying to get the dogs to calm down. Every clatter and bump rattled their already jangled nerves, but eventually the noises became smaller and fewer, with more creaks than crashes.
Eventually, Madeline headed out the back door and made her way through the thigh-deep snow to get a better view of the front of the house.
“So much for stick season!” a cheery voice called from behind her. It was Donald, carrying a shovel and dragging a sled with what appeared to be firewood.
“Stick what?” Madeline felt like she was in a dream.
“Stick season. A blessedly quiet time between leaf peeping and skiers. Generally lasts about a six to eight weeks, and it’s usually in November. But with all this… I’ll bet the mountain opens early this year.” Donald gave a jovial shrug. “Brought you some wood, by the way-didn’t know if you’d had time to order any.”
“You order wood? I was just going to get some at the grocery store…”
“You’re going to need a lot more wood than you can get at the grocery store,” Donald replied. “You’ll want fires through April at least. Save you money on heating oil when you aren’t full with guests. I can’t even imagine how much oil you’ll go through.”
“Yeah, I can’t imagine, either,” Madeline trembled. She was also going to need some warmer pants.
She thanked Donald and turned to lead him back inside.
“Since you’ve got guests now, I’ll send some help over to dig out these front doors,” Donald said as he pulled the sled and followed her around to the only accessible door.
“We don’t have guests right now,” she replied.
“Oh-thought I saw someone up in one of the rooms,” Donald mumbled. “Must have been your daughter.”
“Yes. I’m sure it was.”