They warned me to stay away from the white powder, but I didn't listen.  They told me that once I started, I'd keep doing it until I died, and I nearly did.  This is my story.  But first, let me tell you somebody else's story...  Nah, I'll guess I'll start with mine.

At 7 o'clock one fine winter morning I opened the garage door and saw an amount of white powder up to this point witnessed only by Admiral Peary and those who've seen Marion Barry's police surveillance video.  The snow had drifted against the garage door and was deeper than Steven Hawking after smoking a dime bag.  I looked at the tons of snow drifted all down my 40 yard long driveway, then glanced at my little shovel which was sitting alone in a corner of the garage.  I felt as if God had ordered me to wash the studio audience at the taping of a Richard Simmons infomercial, then handed me a two-inch swatch of cloth and a turkey baster.

By the time I'd finished looking heavenward and cursing the almighty for forsaking me, it was 7:15 a.m. I had to get to work, somehow.  As I went back in the house to get my coat, hat and gloves, I kept hearing the haunting voices of those who told me that if I was going to move to the country, I should get a snowblower.  I'd put it off for too long.  It was too late.  I was going to have to shovel my way out or we would be stranded for the winter and starve.  My home would turn into "The Shining" without the tender moments.  I also knew that clearing the driveway would be a monumental task, one that would make Hebrew slaves under Ramses II look like contestants on "Springer Break".   My choices were clear; starve or shovel.  Somehow though I knew that either way the coroner's report would read, "Cause of Death: No Snowblower."

I went outside, took the shovel in hand, got a nice backswing and plunged it into the white beast. It let off a moan as the sharp blade tore into it.  No, wait, that was me moaning.  I kept digging and digging, and with every scoop the wind replaced that snow with some fresh snow.  After about an hour of digging, scooping and throwing I was moving along at more or less the speed of the Western Front.  As I hacked and wheezed along, I felt my shovel hit something.  I figured it was just another one of those damned frozen cavemen, but upon closer inspection it was some sort of pale object which was hard to see since it was covered in ice.

I took the frozen whatever it was inside and held it in the sink under some warm running water, treating it like you would any package you got in the mail...from Ted Kacinski.  I submerged it in the sink as the ice covering it melted away.  I fully expected it to be the cryogenically frozen head of Walt Disney, but it was just a basketball I must have left outside in the waning moments of the fall weather after a long day of amazing the neighbors with my windmill slam dunks and reverse lay-ups (you've gotta love those Playskool basketball hoops).

When I was about to head back outside to continue my quest, my wife had to do what I think is some sort of contractual obligation in any marriage, and that's to remind you how many people have heart attacks every year while shoveling snow.  I was frankly more concerned at the fact that my spinal cord was dragging behind me when I walked than having a heart attack, but it was her duty to inform me of the inherent dangers in demanding physical labor.  Then she sent me back out to do it some more.

What is it about shoveling snow that turns the arteries of so many men into the LA freeway system at rush hour?  We seem to be able to perform other tasks without needing immediate angioplasty.  We build things, no problem.  We can push mow the lawn, no problem.  Hell, I've heard that a guy even had sex with Camryn Manheim and lived to tell about it (a task scientists claim is the equivalent of 3 years of shoveling snow all crammed into a 5 minute activity...3 minutes if you believe her).  I think it has something to do with the sheer "Man vs. Nature" aspect of shoveling snow.  When you mow the lawn, you don't feel like you're competing against the grass, just dominating it.  But with the snow, it's different.  It challenges you, it fools you, if bluffs you, it gets down your pants and gives you a freezer burn you'll never forget.  Our hearts can't take it.  It's the devil in a cold white chiffon gown seducing you with false promises of a clear driveway.  A Satanistic temptress fooling you into...well, you get the picture.

I went back to work.  I was now feeling like I was making some progress.  By this time it was around 9 o'clock in the morning but my spine was beginning to feel like peanut brittle in Brian Dennehy's back pocket.  I was to a point where I was almost obsessed with shoveling.  I was going to get the job done.  I was going to get to work that day.  I was going to overcome.  I was going to...kill that son of a bitch across the street who has a truck with a plow and keeps driving by and won't help me out.  One of my neighbors, who I won't mention because I think he knows my web site address, drove up, looked at me, and then just blew right on by like Crystal Gayle past a salon.  It was okay though, because I remembered the old saying that "revenge is a dish best served cold."  If that was the case, my entire frostbitten body was doubling as a revenge buffet.

By 10 o'clock I had shoveled a volume that only myself and the guy who had to dig Raymond Burr's grave could relate to, but I was almost there.  I could see the end in sight.  For over 3 1/2 hours I had been battling to the death with the blizzard monster, but victory was almost mine.  As I reached the end of the driveway I reacted like Manhattan on V.J. Day.  In my own mind I was having a ticker tape parade at the end of my driveway.  Just as I popped the cork on an imaginary bottle of Dom, I saw it.

Coming up the road was a township snow plow pushing toward me a white wave of enormous size.  I felt as if I were watching a photo negative version of the beginning of "Hawaii Five-O" on an I-MAX movie screen.  Like a deck worker on an aircraft carrier trying to wave off a landing by the Three Stooges, I ran to the side of the road in a pathetic attempt to stop the truck before it filled the end of my driveway once again with tons of snow.  I failed.

As I stood screaming to the Gods, I felt chest pains.  Could I be the next victim of this demon snow?  I belched.  The pains disappeared.  I had to continue shoveling.

Damn.

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