Salt-Covered Windshields

Well, we’ve survived two weeks of the new work schedule, so I thought I’d give an update to those comparing the changes to my family and the First Family. (Both families started new jobs about the same time, we both got new dogs and both have two kids that are going through this also.)

I don’t know about President Obama, but this week, I found that I could lie to my kids and not feel guilty. This happened on Thursday. I had to be at work by 9 a.m. to conduct a training class with people from the U.S. and London. The class had been planned for over a week, so I’d gone over pretty much every scenario and figured I could manage getting the kids up, fed, dressed and to school and still make it in on time. (For those detailed oriented people, with my daughter, the order is very important. If she eats before she is dressed, she needs at least another shirt, sometimes pants and socks have to be changed too.) (This is the same girl that thinks strawberries and yellow mustard is a “delicious” combination. She also turns from a platinum blonde to a redhead when she eats spaghetti.)

I took a few minutes Wednesday night with my son, explaining that we had to leave early in the morning and if he could help me, he’d earn more points. (I know, that’s bribery, but keep in mind the starting theme of this article. Just think of it as me starting him out early on a career as a politician.) Well, Thursday morning came and I still maintain that there is nothing positive about 6 a.m. We’ve gotten our routine down and we were all ready and in the car by 6:45, an hour ahead of our normal schedule. My son was doing his best for extra points.

When we got in the car, it was still dark. My daughter’s little voice whispered, “I scared.”

My son, still in his helpful mode, (I can see why lobbyist like their jobs.) explained, “She’s scared cause it’s dark.”

“It’s not that dark,” I grumbled and tried to back up the driveway. Mother Nature had decided to put my planning skills to the test and graced us with another night of snowfall. I found myself silently joining their morning chant of “Let’s crash, let’s crash, let’s crash.” (See the previous article on my children’s sadistic desire to see my car wrapped around a tree.) Unfortunately, we made it up the driveway without hitting a single tree. Halfway to preschool, my daughter broke the silence with, “I not scared anymore, daddy. It bright out.”

She was right, somewhere, the sun was rising. For the past two weeks, I’ve been getting up before the sun has risen, but sometime during getting my monsters fed and dressed, the sun had risen. This morning, it greeted us as we drove.

“Don’t you like the sun rise, daddy?” My son’s voice was far too bright and cheerful for this early. I considered explaining that daddy does not like anything until after three cups of coffee, but he was keeping his sister happy and I didn’t want to risk that. (I still had to get them out of the car, into preschool, their stuff put away and hands washed before I could make my escape.)

The Lie: “Yes, I love the sun rise. It makes me very happy.”

That led to a discussion on where the sun was. I had no idea. The sky was overcast and I was running low on clear windshield. The snow from last night had melted while the car warmed up so all the salt residue was cleaned off when we started. However, at 0 degrees, the windshield washer fluid was frozen.

While this sounds dangerous, I’ve got the routine down. After dropping the kids off, I get back on the main roads and the passing trucks kick up enough spray to keep the windshield somewhat clean. By the time I get into Pittsburgh, everything has unfrozen and I can clean the windshield.

It was just after the sunrise comment when my wife called. She’d left for work an hour earlier. Surely, she was calling to tell me traffic was fine and to take my time. Instead, she was in a backup and wanted directions on a different way into the city. After dropping the kids off, I checked and still had two hours to drive the 40 miles to work. After Washington, DC traffic, there was no way I couldn’t handle this.
Unless the backup that my wife had been in was an accident that had traffic snarled for ten miles. 20 degrees, that’s when the windshield washer pump unfreezes. I sat in the crawling traffic watching the temperature, the other cars and the time. You’ve heard of rose-colored glasses? I have a salt-covered windshield. Behind that layer of near impenetrable grime, everything slows down. I realized it didn’t matter if I was a few minutes late. You can’t control traffic any more than you can control when the temperature will get above 20.

Work

I found something this past week that I haven’t seen for many years. Apparently, 6 a.m. really does exist. I learned this during the past week when I started a new job.

Before all the professionals that read my blog get up in arms, let me give a little back-story. There was a time, many years ago, when I was working as a server administrator that I often got to work well before the sun rose. It was almost relaxing fixing the problems that had arisen during the night with no one around to demand attention or ask annoying questions.

Then we had children. My wife and I came up with a unique schedule that worked quite well for us. I’d take the night shift (When I got home from work until 2 a.m.) and she took from 2 a.m. on. There have been many times over the years that I’ve gone to work bleary-eyed and short on sleep. In my defense, I do my best work when I am light-headed. I think it has something to do with no sleep not inhibiting the creative process. (There have been times when this has also interfered with my self-editing. See the article below.)

But this time it’s different. My wife started a new job also. We not only have to figure out our schedule, but also make sure our kids see us and get to school on time. This past week, my mother-in-law came in to help us and was an amazing help. She made sure we didn’t have to worry about the kids getting where they needed while my wife and I adapted to the new schedule. (For the record, I can say nice things about my wife’s mother.) (Just don’t expect another nice comment for several months.)

So, this past week, I was rudely reacquainted with 6 a.m. I can honestly report that it is dark, cold and early. I looked, I really did, but in all candor, I couldn’t find anything positive about this time. Especially since we’d switched the schedules. My wife is leaving before the little monsters are up, stranding me alone to get them fed, dressed and ready for school.

I also found out how sadistic my children are. (Proving that they really are my wife’s children.) We made this change and it seemed like about 47 feet of snow fell over a two-week period. We’d known about my wife’s job and had made sure she had good snow tires on her minivan. Since most of my driving had been to Washington, DC and back, it hadn’t been a priority to get snow tires on my car. My new job caught us by surprise so there hasn’t been enough time to go and get tires that can actually handle western Pennsylvania weather.

Each morning, during the past week, has started with my son asking, “Do I have school today?” (It doesn’t help that apparently when the weather is going to be below a certain temperature, the schools here tell the students when there will be a two-hour delay. And my son listens when he hears that.) Problem is, if there’s a two hour delay, he still has to go to preschool where the bus picks him up. By the time they are dressed, and the car is warmed up and the snow has been cleared off, he has his sister wound up too so neither want to go to school.

I can’t blame them. After this past week, staying in a warm bed and sleeping does have a great appeal. Apparently, I wasn’t listening to what I said that first morning as I looked at the snow covering my car and the driveway. I may have muttered something about not going anywhere if I slid off the driveway.

So, each morning starts with the cheer of, “Let’s crash, daddy!” If they’ve had enough time to wake up, they’ll even give suggestion to help the odds of crashing. “Go faster.” “Hit the gas.” “Lookout for that tree.” and "Drive like mommy." As I back up the driveway, trying to stay in the tracks my wife made earlier, (This is harder than it sounds since the minivan is wider than my Prius, so we usually end up siding back and forth.) my daughter shows her confidence in me by covering her eyes and screaming. (I have to admit, there are times when I follow her example and we hit a perfect harmony)

So, how are we adapting to the new schedule? I’ve found that making their lunches, getting the coffee ready for the morning and putting their clothes out the night before saves me about 10 minutes. I tried to put them in their school clothes one night to save even more time. I could tell by the look my wife gave me that this was too much. (Next time, I’ll wait until she’s asleep before I try that.) 6 a.m. gives me time to have a slice of coffee, (This early, it has to be strong.) get dressed and ready. I think in three to four years, we’ll have adapted to the new schedule just fine.

Snow

We had our first real snow fall of the year this past weekend. So, of course this meant my wife was sick and the kids had to go sled riding. With no other option, I did the daddy thing. Both kids were bundled up until they couldn't move and shoved outside. Since my wife was still in the house, I had to go out with them.

I made the first run down the hill next to the house. When we bought the house, one of the selling points for me was the hill it sat on. I saw many winters of fun sled riding with the kids. In DC, the snow usually lasted a weekend at most and the hills near our house dumped you out into a busy road. So, while it looked fun, and I kept telling my wife we could always make more, sled riding was frowned upon. Another nice feature that both my wife and I liked was the creek that ran through the property. Unfortunately, I didn't quite put all the geometry and physics together when we bought the house. Water runs down hill, and that is also the general path a sled will take. This meant that the sled run tended to end up at the creek. Luckily, there was a row of bushes and trees that bordered the creek. So, you'd have to be going pretty darn fast to actually make it into the creek.

Last year, both kids had been too young and it was easy to keep them toward the bottom of the hill. This year, I think my son is going to feel the need for speed, especially when his friends come over. If it was just me, I wouldn't worry. By the time he has his long johns, snow pants, boots, coat, hat and mittens on, he is pretty much invulnerable to anything. He has rolling off down pat. There is nothing quite as funny as watching him fly down the hill, snow flying over his head until he dives off the sled, the red mingling with the white. However, with his mother, and both grandparents ready to voice their "opinions" on safety, I'm pretty sure we will be making the sledding hill "kid friendly."

This year, I figured it would be a slow run to start. We only had a little over an inch of snow. A few runs down and most of the snow should be gone. I didn't take into account the leaves. We had a belt break on the tractor this fall, so I dug out the manual and replaced it. After successfully proving my mechanical manhood, I was able to use the tractor to gather the leaves that had fallen. What I didn't take into account was that if one belt breaks, there's a good chance the remaining ones are probably going to break soon. That soon was before the majority of the leaves in our three acres covered the ground. Between work, school starting and general laziness, I never got around to replacing that second belt. So, we have a nice layer of leaves covering the grass. When you add snow on top of the leaves, you get Mother Nature's grease.
That first run, over the thin snow turned into a race of death to the creek. Of course both kids stood at the top of the hill cheering. They must have mistaken my screams as excitement. Luckily, the first row of trees slowed me enough that I gracefully plowed into the prickers right along the back of the creak.

The next time it snows, I'm making sure I get sick first.