Payday in the snow

The snowfall in the D.C. area has been well documented on my family's website. Lots of shovelling, scraping, more shovelling, and even more shovelling.

While everyone in the family has taken several turns shovelling us out, Colin and Carson have done yeoman's work this winter. On mornings that I've shovelled at 6 a.m. so I could get to work, Carson was there, bleary eyed but ready. Colin has taken on two big storms, clearing the driveway even as the flakes kept coming down so we wouldn't have as much to move later. We don't have to ask them to help, they just put on their snow gear and get to work.

While seeing their work ethic has been a joy for me as a dad, the time outside has also given us time to talk as we work. It's been great. A quantity of quality time together. A payday as a father (that's what my old bishop Ron Prescott would call it).

The best payday was last Sunday. After almost five hours of shovelling on Saturday, we had been back out for almost four hours more on Sunday. Thankfully the sun was shining and the amount of cleared asphalt driveway greatly surpassed the amount of snow left to clear. We were tired, sore, hungry, and ready to be done. We figured we had about an hour left.

Yvonne asked if we wanted to stop for lunch. Colin and Carson both said they'd rather finish than take off their boots and winter clothes to go inside for lunch. We all knew how hard it would be to come back out after we had gone inside. So Yvonne brought sandwiches and chips and drinks to us. We pulled out some six-gallon buckets and a stool to sit on and ate lunch on the wet driveway.

It was a scene I wish I could have captured, but I'll never forget it. The three of us sat and talked like men (fitting, since they worked like men), surrounded by the large piles of snow we built, the proof of our labors. Under a brilliant blue sky, steam rose from the wet asphalt as it was heated by the noon-day sun.

That wasn't a payday for a dad, it was a bonus.