Snow ruins everything

OK, maybe not everything. I had fun playing in the snow as a child, building snowmen, having snowball fights with neighborhood friends, and sledding on the hill in our yard.  There was one year when we had so much snow, it was over my head as I traversed our front sidewalk!! Growing up in Minnesota, snow was part of life just like it is here in Michigan.

However, as I aged, snow became less fun. My family was not into winter sports (skiing, snowmobiling, ice fishing). It just became the white stuff that caused problems.

There was the year that my 17^th birthday weekend was marred by two separate car crashes caused by snow-hidden ice patches. My mother gave me my first curfew after the revving engine of my boyfriend’s truck woke her while we tried to get it unstuck after an unexpected snowfall. Getting married in February, I stressed over the possibility of my in-laws trapped in Fargo, ND and missing our wedding since the interstate would shut down during snowstorms. Trapped in Fargo by blizzards has become an annual problem when we visit for the holidays. As a mother of teenage and adult children, I worry about them driving in it.

But when plans to attend GLTE in January 2025 fell through because of lake effect snow, I decided to try and reframe. I don’t think I will ever be excited to see snow. But with no intention of moving south, it was time to find the positives.

Snow forces us to slow down, literally, and figuratively. Lower road speeds are necessary. But snow also reminds us of the importance of arriving safely at our destination or making the difficult decision not to travel.

Winter is a time of respite for many of us in the Green Industry. Spring, summer and fall can bring long hours of hard work and time lost with family and friends. But winter is quieter, allowing us to catch up. Winter hobbies can be rediscovered.

Sleep was hard to come by in my young age. If I was having a particularly bad night, I would patter down the stairs in search of parental help, or at least sympathy. Inevitably, I would find my night-owl father watching reruns of Cheers or M*A*S*H. As I grew older, those same shows would be the background noise for my late-night study sessions. I grew up in the tents of the 4077th M*A*S*H unit in Korea.

One of my dad’s favorite characters on M*A*S*H, was Klinger. Klinger was from Toledo and was a big Toledo MudHens fan, so Dad has a fascination with the MudHens. Hmm, I still need to get him to a game one of these days, and maybe make a stop at Tony Packo’s.

My favorite was Corporal Walter Eugene “Radar” O’Reilly. How could you not love the man-boy admin for the Colonel? He slept with a teddy bear, his voice barely out of puberty. Radar’s rank may have been low on the totem pole, but he had that camp running like a well-oiled machine. Radar’s quiet efficiency, attention to detail, fine-tuned observational powers, and his uncanny ability to anticipate the needs of his superiors are what every good administrative assistant strives for. 

Enter me, the detail-oriented, part-timer whose goal is to take some of the load for the plant and hardscape experts. Unless you catch me on a morning walk around the blocks, you may never see me. But hopefully, you see my work at the periphery when you’re admiring the superior plants, hard goods, and hardscape materials that the Buyers have the time and energy to find. I will continue to channel Radar O’Reilly, fade into the background while supporting my coworkers and in turn, our customers.