William is the grandson of one of Rural Womyn Zone’s long time members and it appears he is a “chip of the old block” in his choice to help make the world a better place. We have often marveled at the many selfless hours his grandmother has given to help domestic violence victims in her area and it truly warmed my heart to read William’s tribute to his grandmother which can be found here.
While I could go on forever singing praises to this woman’s dedication to domestic violence advocacy it is her latest project that I would like to bring to light. You see, along with her many other activities, she sits on the board of Pretty Bird Woman House, a women’s shelter in Standing Rock, South Dakota. The shelter is in danger of closing due to lack of funding. A fundraising effort is under way and can be found by clicking the links above. Please help if you can.
In closing, I would like to echo William’s words. She is our hero too and so is her grandson of whom I know she is truly proud.
Today, the eastern part of the state is, for all practical purposes, closed — roads, schools, towns, city, county, and state offices. Even the U.S. Mail has been suspended. Four days before Christmas.
When I was a little girl and it was going to storm, my father always told my mother she should go to town and buy a sack of flour. She would go buy groceries, and I always wondered what we were going to do with all that flour. I imagine that my grandmother, who used to can and had food put up in the cellar and had chickens in the chicken house, only needed to make sure she had flour so she could bake bread when a storm came and they couldn’t get to town.
We took storms seriously. We knew they were dangerous for people and animals. We got ready for them by checking the heaters on the water tanks, bringing cows in from the pasture, checking fence, and laying in feed and bedding supplies for the pens. Whatever was laying around that was heavy was thrown in the back of the pickup for extra weight, along with a scoop shovel, battery chargers, battery cables, chains, and a couple of extra bales of hay. Hoses were rolled up and stored in the barn. Winter coveralls, boots, caps, long johns, wool socks, and gloves were laid out.
When the blizzards came, everyone kept working until it got too dangerous or too futile for people to be out caring for animals, and then we holed up in the house until the wind quit blowing and the blizzard was over, and we could start digging out. Normal activities came to a standstill.
Except for milking. The cows had to be milked twice a day no matter what. If the power went off, a generator was turned on long enough to power the milkhouse and get the milking done. While the power was on, someone in the house filled the bathtub with water, prepared some food, and turned up the heat for a while until the generator was shut off when the milking was done. Then everyone wrapped back up in all the blankets and quilts. It was too cold to do anything else.
When a storm was coming, appointments in town or in the city were cancelled. We were expected to use “common sense” and not go out on the roads unless it was absolutely necessary. One year, a relative started in a tractor to go to the farm where the milking was done, got disoriented in the white out, and ended up driving around in circles for a couple of hours. People on the highway would pull in and ask if they could stay until the roads were passable again.
The weather station announced this storm for at least 24 hours before it hit: A winter storm warning from 6 a.m. Wednesday to 5 p.m. Thursday, with 10 to 20 inches of snow and winds 25 to 30 miles an hour, with gusts up to 40 miles an hour for all of Northeast Colorado and the front range corridor, from Denver north and south. The snowfall would be heavy with one to two inches per hour.
Lots of people in the city still got up and went to work on Interstate and other highways on Wednesday morning. Many of them got stranded during the storm that came in exactly as predicted, with one to two inches of snow per hour. The roads were not made impassable just by the icy rain that fell before the snow, but by the sheer depth of the snow on top of the ice. More people went out in the storm to rescue those who were stranded. Cell phones were busy in the country, keeping tabs on cowboys who went out to check cows who went over the fence when the snow began to blow.
Having the storm come the last few days before Christmas has interrupted lots of people’s plans. There are 4,500 people waiting in the Denver airport for it to resume flights some time tomorrow.
We had already put some of our plans on hold over a week before the storm, when a family member learned he had to have surgery and we went out of town with him for a week while that was done. We just got back to our homes in time to buy that sack of flour and get stocked up before the storm hit.
I ordered some gifts online before I went out of town. They are in cardboard boxes stacked on my kitchen table. There is no Christmas tree in my house. Some of the relatives who were coming this weekend will not be able to get here. We will not all be gathering in the same place for our traditional Christmas Eve supper because of the surgery and the weather. We will just do whatever we are able to do that day, which for some will include staying in out of the cold and not having too much company.
I am snowed in in my old farmhouse in the country until I call someone to come with a tractor to get me out. There is no sense to do that until the wind stops blowing. It won’t be today. Huge drifts that I haven’t seen since I was a little girl with a sled have blown up to my back door and closed off the driveway.
I can work on some of my gift plans which include making photo albums for some of the children. I could get the tree out, but the grandchildren aren’t coming to my house until after Christmas this year. I am tempted to put up the tree only because I want to see lights tonight when it is dark and snowy.
It is very quiet in a house surrounded by snow. The lights and heat are on. Our family member who had surgery is making good progress every day. I got enough snow away from the back door that I can quit feeling claustrophobic. I am not frantic about buying more presents, or even wrapping them, or writing out cards that it is now too late to mail after life and weather intervened in plans and schedules. I am just thankful for our family, for our health, for recovery from surgery, for lights and food, a roof over my head, and some food in the cupboard.
One thing that the adults always did when there was a blizzard that they never did the rest of the time was just lay down and take a nap. They did it because it was too cold to do anything else. Even though I’m not cold, I think I’ll take a nap just to keep up the tradition.