TWO NIGHTS EARLIER FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 19TH
SHORTLY BEFORE MIDNIGHT JON
Next chapter begins today!
Hanna’s message had come through just as we were preparing to turn in for the night. We’d arrived at the cabin hours earlier—in the dark, as was usual that time of year. And—as was usual that time of year—we’d spent several hours settling in. Our weekend retreat nestled in the deep woods of Idaho is not without its own set of chores and maintenance responsibilities—especially during the winter months.
Idaho snow is as dense and unrelenting as it is beautiful. Often, when we share photos of our wintery accumulation with friends and family in various parts of the world—photos of our cabin picturesquely buried under drifts several feet deep—they marvel at the sheer amount of it.
Snow in this part of Idaho is more than a part of life. In many ways itis life. Two of our major industries—tourism and agriculture—rely on a good snowfall each year. Millions of skiers, snowboarders, and other winter thrill-seekers descend upon Idaho’s numerous resort spots each year to carve fresh tracks in the abundance of seasonal snow. Those in agriculture are counting on a dense snowpack and good runoff to replenish reservoirs that will feed the state’s agricultural areas through another long, dry summer.
I, for one, find myself firmly in both camps. I love to get out to the cabin after a good snowfall to do some snowmobiling, and I also know how important that end-of-season runoff is for the potato industry—the very industry that brought me to Idaho in the first place. So, when the snow comes, we’re grateful for its beautiful inconvenience. We work through it—literally.
Tracy and I built our cabin just about an hour and a half north of our home. We wanted to be close enough to enjoy it often yet far enough away to allow us to fully appreciate the remote and isolated nature. We purchased the land in 2007, began building in 2013, and completed our weekend getaway spot roughly a year later. The winding road we now know so well delivers us almost weekly to our cabin where we indulge in both quiet time together and solitary endeavors. For me, for about a third of the year, those solitary hours mean one thing: snow.
When we arrive at the cabin after a big snow, the chores begin. First, the long driveway needs to be cleared. But the trick here is that the snowblower is kept in the garage—at the end of the driveway.
Tracy has the pleasure of watching from the warmth of the car as I high-step through the deep snow, making my way to the garage. With the snowblower up and running, I blow a path back to the car and one to the house to free Tracy. Once that’s done, I have the task of clearing the rest of the driveway to pull the car in.
My chores don’t end there. Solar panels are a wonderful invention for powering a cabin tucked away in the remote Idaho woods. The thing is they need sun to function. So, more time is spent clearing the panels.
While it seems like a lot of work to be done for a weekend’s enjoyment, the payoff is worth it. I love the opportunity to get out into the vast stillness that is southwestern Idaho covered in snow. There is really nothing quite like it.
But all that blinding, isolated quiet gives you a lot of time alone with your thoughts. Friday, February 19, my thoughts were consumed by my daughter and her impending trip.
I try my best to remain “hands off” in these situations with my children. After all, they are adults, impossible though that still seems to me at times. Sometimes, I’ll admit, Hanna doesn’t make that easy.
As I worked my way through the snow that Friday evening, I reflected on Hanna’s relative silence since her arrival in the Netherlands for a short visit with friends and family before heading on to Egypt.
After nine months with her mother and me at home, she leaves for Amsterdam and drops off the face of the Earth.
This always happens when she goes to Amsterdam. It swallows her up, and we don’t hear from her for days at a time. That is not unusual, but during Hanna’s time at home during the COVID pandemic, I’d grown accustomed to our conversations, and I don’t think I had been fully prepared for them to end so abruptly once she traveled to Amsterdam.
I’m not being sentimental here—I’m thinking specifically about our talks regarding her upcoming trip. When Hanna first told us about her p
