Even Pawtucket Can be Pretty...

Slater Park Duck Pond

 

 

It snowed overnight, more than I thought. Had I been still in school I'd be disappointed that it wasn't enough to cancel it. One time in eighth grade, I stared out my front window and noticed that the snow in the street hadn't piled up past the 4 inch street curb opposite this house.

 

“Shit...gotta go to school today.” I said to myself.

 

I saw the unburied curb this morning and it's funny how a small memory from so long ago will come back to me.

 

Since it snowed, this will keep people in their homes and I can walk my overly rambunctious dog. He doesn't do too well when I take him to the park as there are a hundred other dog walkers there as well on nice days. To him, every other dog he sees within 100 feet must die or at least be growled and barked at. It's a pain to deal with. So, these snowy days are a relief in one sense.

 

There are a few times when Slater Park is actually beautiful in the snow. You have to go soon before it starts melting off the trees and before it fills up with people. I've never been to the Grand Tetons but there must be a sense of quiet that is somewhat comparable? In any event, when the park is unpopulated with people and the snow deadens the sound of the far off traffic, it is pretty quiet. I can imagine I'm at the bottom of some mountain pass.

 

I'm not sure if you can pick this up but you can smell the snow. Not only that, dry vs heavy wet snow each has it's own scent. To note this, it helps to be away from all the car/furnace exhaust that the suburbs belch out. The snow today has a very clean wet smell. That's not astonishing. I ordinarily barely notice that if I have a busy day. The odor is there but I'm too engrossed with trying to buy stamps or shop for food. I suppose what is striking is if I pay any attention to it at all. Well, this morning I did. When there are few distractions, you naturally will focus in on these things.

 

*****

 

I have an old friend who I hadn't seen in quite some time who used to man the weather post on top of Mt Washington...in January. I found it surprising and wanted to know what the weather and life was like up there during the deepest of winter. You can imagine how bitingly cold and isolated it is. It's that and in spades I was told.

 

So why go there? Why find, in essence, the most barren of places to live for a month?

 

It came to me a few days later. Peace and quiet.

 

The weather up there utterly compels you to be cocooned. Winter itself does that down here too to a lesser degree. I'm 80 feet above sea level and I usually hibernate in winter, though I'm not that constrained as I'd be atop a mountain. In either case, atop a mountain or in a local park, there's quiet to be found. It matters on how much stillness you want. My friend just found, probably, the best spot in New England in winter if you want to “get away from it all.” Of course, he wasn't entirely alone. The post is manned with scientists and others from NOAA. Ensconced like that does change how you feel and how you react to those around you. You learn to give one another privacy, even if there is only 200 square feet in that office you're both sharing. You just can't step outside for a cigarette, unless you want to be frozen solid in seven minutes, then blown off the mountaintop. 

If you're not the type to got batshit crazy from cabin fever, the top of this mountain probably has the remedy for peace you've been seeking. I'm not sure if I'd try it for that long, perhaps a few days, to see what it's all about.  

 

“Life can wear you down at times, especially as you get older.” B tells me. He should know, he's “up there.” He tells me it's not surprised people do this. Everyone goes on vacation. Everyone wants to get away from it all, and perhaps for a bit longer than your usual camping trip to Acadia. He himself purposely once demanded assignment to a NATO base in Greenland, called Thule.

 

Thule was a SAC airforce base 500 miles south of the North Pole. It was constantly frozen solid and it's purpose was to sit there and await the call from NORAD to fire up the FB-111's to fly to Russia and nuke it to hell. They never got the call, of course. He never did tell me what his position was in detail, except working along with GE, who were rewiring, reconfiguring the radar systems that dot the base.

 

“It takes a few weeks but the barrenness of rock, glacier and sea ice does calm you” he told me.

 

“What about boredom?” I ask.

 

“That, is part of your adjustment...there comes a point where you forget all about TV channels, radio, crowded cities and every other distraction that can tug at you...you learn to relax finally.”

 

“You sure picked the most out of the way place imaginable!” I tell him.

 

“Yep, six months of the year it's dark or barely twilight, it's so far north you're above the aurora circle, you never see it, that's how close to the Pole you are.”

 

“When I came back, via Labrador, Montreal and finally La Guardia, the hustle and bustle of the city didn't bug me in the least. My personality had remained changed after that for a good six months. Nothing really bugged me.” he went on.

 

I tell him, “After a vacation, people feel great for ONE day when they return to work...too bad it doesn't last long.”

 

“You haven't been far enough away!” he told me.

 

Ok, so I was 1.3 miles away from the suburbs this morning. It wasn't Mt Washington nor Thule, but it was a nice walk through the pines today, with a dog that couldn’t go ballistic on other animals.