Adventures on the Farm

I've mentioned before that on Fridays I pick up milk from a farm a little ways north of here. I also usually teach a violin lesson, but my student and his family were out of town for Thanksgiving, so I just went to the farm today. I went earlier than normal because I wanted to make it home before dark. As I said last week, I'm not a big fan of driving around up there in the dark. And I wrote about that before we got a bunch of snow. I called my mom and asked her to come with me to keep me company on what is not a terribly exciting voyage, but also to be there in case something bad happened.

I'm glad I had the foresight to do that. And I'm glad she said yes. Thanks, Mom.

I'm also glad I wear layers in the winter. And I'm glad I wore my snow boots today, instead of my tall leather boots that I sometimes wear around town in the snow. I knew I was going to the farm, so I thought, "Hmmm...I think snow boots are a good idea." I had no idea how right I was.

So, we got to the farm no problem. There is a long gravel drive that winds through the farm, back to the house where we get our milk. The drive loops around in front of the house, making turning around normally very easy. However, you have to go down to get to the house and then the loop goes up hill to complete itself. The first inkling that all would not go quite as swimmingly as usual was when we started slipping a bit as we came around the top of the loop. So, I stopped at the top and walked down to the house, retrieved my milk and came back to the car. I figured going down the first hill would give me enough momentum to get back out so we could go home. I made it about halfway up the hill, then couldn't go further and when I let off the gas we started slipping backwards. And no matter how I turned the wheel I couldn't control where we went. Mom got out and tried to push, to no avail. The car was more or less sideways across the driveway, but we managed to get it straightened out. I backed up again, put it in low gear this time, and tried again. I got a little further, but the same thing happened again. And the car was rather stuck, once again sideways. Mom asked if I had any cardboard or anything in the trunk that we could put under the tires to gain some traction to get unstuck. I popped the trunk, and Lo and Behold! Chains!

Mom: "I don't know how to put chains on. Do you?"
Me: "Nope."

So, we tried a bit more to get unstuck, but were unsuccessful. It was time to learn to use the chains. So, we got them out, and they had a little instruction pamphlet. Mom read the instructions while I did the dirty work. And it was a bit dirty. Tires, even after being used in the snow, are not clean. And all the slushy gross stuff gets built up in the wheel wells. After much wrangling and sitting and lying in the snow in my jeans I managed to chain up my tires. We got unstuck and tried going up the hill from there. Unfortunately, the chain on the passenger side tire was not secured very well, so it came off before we could get very far. I fixed it (more sitting in the snow) and backed up for another running start. Before we tried again we said a prayer.

This time I made it a little over halfway up the hill, when the driver's side chain came undone. Fortunately, I was able to stop, fix the chain, and keep going without having to start from the bottom. I made it to the top, Mom got back in the car, and we went a little further before one of the chains came off again (it's a good thing we didn't have to go very far with them - and that there weren't any other cars around trying to get past us). Since we were past the worst of it, we took them both off (more sitting/lying in the snow and dealing with dirty, slushy tires and wheel wells). My hands and mittens were by this time quite filthy. I took off the mittens and gave my hands a brisk wash in the snow. It was unpleasant, but cleaned off the worst of the gunk. We made it the rest of the way down the drive (it was a little dicey getting going again, but we managed) and made it out on to the highway without further incident. My jeans were soaked through, my mittens were filthy, and my cuffs were quite wet, but we weren't stuck anymore. At least I was in a warm car, so the wetness didn't matter too much.

It was a rather tiring trip. I feel like I was in an epic battle with my car and the elements.

I won.

And now I know how to use chains (more or less).