EDMONTON EXISTENTIAL
Chipping Away
I saw a bald eagle Monday. Its wingspan was
enormous. It circled over the monstrous Cape Cod
style infill across the street, soaring slightly higher than the tips of the
fir trees visible beyond the property. It flexed its dark wings, caught an
updraft and then coasted back toward the nearby river valley. According to my
illustrated Birds of Edmonton this
migratory beast has hit Alberta’s
capital a month early. It’s been that kind of winter.
I was outside with an ice-breaking tool,
chipping away at the solid inch of blue-grey on the sidewalk, lifting opaque
white shards under a low grey sky. It was mild enough for just a fleece and
rubberized gardening gloves. Our extraordinarily eccentric neighbour Forest made his shuffling approach, head down, watching
his feet. I heard the tick-tick-tick
of his three-pronged metal cane first. I was working because I worry about
brittle folk like him taking a tumble. He paused. I wondered if my Montreal
Canadiens hat annoyed him; the past nine seasons have been tough on Oilers
fans. After a moment he said, ‘The world is made of ice and I have no skates.’
It’s been that kind of winter.
This month the freeze and thaw cycle has
been as relentless as the plunging price of a barrel of oil. We’ve had days of Vancouver rain and nights
of proper prairie cold. Some days there was no place to pile the snow, too much
of it in one fall. Downspouts trickle like country creeks while icicles hang,
suspended from uncommon places. Our streets and avenues are dimpled with
potholes, some of which can be seen from space and will land unsuspecting
drivers in China.
The meteorologists who issue the increasingly frequent weather warnings must be
using kittens, balls of yarn, shaved dice and Twister game mats to divine what’s
coming next. It’s been that kind of winter.
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