in the bleak midwinter
frosty wind made moan
in the bleak midwinter
long long ago

The midwinter mark was February 3 (the season has 88 days); we have turned the corner and are moving towards the end of snow and cold.

Yes, there was a time, long long ago, when winter was full of things to do and the snow and the cold were just incidentals. Why pay attention to your cold toes when there was a rink to shovel; when there was a warming-hut full of friends and hot apple-cider? Why worry about the 10 inches of new snow when there was a Bon Soo 1 dance to get to and a promise that Jim Morrison would plead, Come on baby, light my fire?
 

Remember Ron’s 1959 Buick LaSabre?
Yeah, we spun round and round up on Pine Street hill.
Whoa! Man, that was great.

That was a boat not a car.
The tree-huger speaks. Oh speak again dark angel.
We all fit in that boat and in winter it went everywhere. And don’t forget, we were the only kids from the West-End
with a friend who had his own car. Yeah Ron!!

Hey, hadn’t you just started dating that Anita chick? Man, you were the first one to have a girlfriend.
Oh wait, you still have one of those.

 

My favorite memory, was tobogganing down Garson’s Hill.
You took my brother’s toboggan without even asking.
Well, I wasn’t going down on no sleigh. Them was for losers.

Tobogganing was great until we started cross-country. Remember going down the snowbanks at my parents’ with our first skis? Yeah! 2 seconds of downhill.

My sister smoked and she still kicked my ass on the trails. She could do the Pinder
9K extension and never break a sweat. Man, I hated her.
Aren’t you like supposed to get winded and wheeze when you smoke a pack a day?

This from the man who refused to pay trail-fees. And bragged about it. Of course, focus on your sister
and not on your ILLEGAL activities.

You have nothing to say, so put a straw in that mickey, shuck on it and shut-up.
Remember you refused to come skiing, because it was TOO COLD. A Canadian whining about winter.                                                                    

 
1 Bon Soo – the Ontario Winter Carnival, Sault Ste Marie
Images: top left – kitchen outside wall; top right – 1959 Buick LaSabre; bottom right – Hiawatha Highlands trail