I Refuse To Know It

Father said snow was the best fertilizer. I never knew what that man was talking about.

He’s under the snow now; and the dirt and the fallow grass. Buried on the farm, like he wanted. I think of him under there, a kind of pole for the earth to turn about. That was his purpose, I expect.

The snow vexes me. Makes me wait. It transubstantiates and drips in to a pan in the hall. It knows I can’t fix the leak until the snow is gone but then I can’t find it because it doesn’t leak any more. Snow isn’t evil, but it’s a trickster just the same.

My wife makes me do things. It’s all undone in here all the time for the season is so short and it’s all on the line every day. She can’t understand how I sleep like a drunkard through the thunderstorms on a July night while she’s terrified, but range around the house when the snow lies quiet outside. The thunder brings rain, so I am at peace. The snow brings a halt a man can never afford.

But everything I do is worth doing in January. But I wouldn’t do it if the sun was riding high in the sky in his chariot. Dad knew. My wife knows. The snow knows.

I refuse to know it.