My 30 foot noble fir tree in front yard & ice cycles
Snow is like S h*t it can only get deeper and stinks !
That was my perception when I was worked for a living.
This year is the first time a snow storm hit and I was not working. This year also is the first time since I became a working adult said, After I looking outside to find Snow piled up and Ice Sickles hanging from eves of the house "it's Snowing" without muttered that little four letter word .
As a kid living in Valsetz Oregon I had Always loved the snow covering all out doors and just couldn't wait to get out in the first snow.
The last part was the only difference in this year's first snow and as a boy in Valsetz.
Yesterday I took in the beauty and serenity but had no desire to go out and romp around in it.
The snow and local news telling of snow days for school kids around Northern Nevada did how ever put me to thinking about Snow days in Valsetz. WE NEVER HAD ONE! Not even when snow was up to and above the waist of first graders! Only when there was no heat in the school come noon did we get out of school.
I began to think of the great times we had as teens doing dumb things.
One of the dumbest was when we got in my friends Model A and drove out on the flats looking for large pools of water frozen over and would accommodate cookie cutting and in general screwing around with the Model A.
Most Valsetzer will remember the County Bridge was the starting point of
private property.
When I was a teen this was great for us kids because we could drive any where on Boise propriety without being cited for driving without a driver licensee.
The driver of the A was at so must risk. If any thing would have happened
he would have been in so much trouble.
Let's say the Model A had rolled over and passengers were hurt, what would he have to answer to? In today's society Reckless driving, careless driving, no driver licensee, no insurance, suits for injures and any thing else the suit happy public of today could think of.
But back then more than likely my friend would have at the most a risk of ticket for no driver's lic. and a big ass busting from his dad along with loss of driving privileges. What a different world is today. Lucky for all of us, the only thing that happened was we all had one hell of a good time!
The best thing about snow and Valsetz was the surrounding hills to go sledging on. And sled we did, all ages and parents. If I remember correctly the favorite spot was the hill up behind the school on weekends.
I hope I've stirred up some old memories of your old days in the snow.
The below story I found in an article from January 16,1969 out of the Oregon Statesman by Tom Wright
Valsetz Post Office and First Aid building
Trip Over Snowy Hill To Valsetz
Is Good Tonic For Tired Nerves
VALSETZ - I rode "shotgun" on the mail run to Valsetz Wednesday.
The hazards weren't the badmen from Black Rock, nor the sidewinders from Cold Springs, but the side-slippers from Dallas and knee-deep freeze from the pacific.
But the mail went Thu again, despite the heavy snow. And for Howard Terry, weathered fugitive from an Idaho Panhandle farm, it was just another "uneventful" trip on his six-times a week calender over "the Hill."
terry, the Dallas -Valsetz half of a brother team that hauls the mail from Salem to Dallas and way points, had already put in a half day's work tending his lambing ewes when he pulled hid mail-laden jeep out of the post office parking lot at 7:31 a.m.
"we're in for it today," he said into a frosty windshield.
He was right.
The highway to Falls City, the first stop on his daily-except-Sunday run,
was coated with ice like the rest of the mid-Willamette Valley.
By Falls City there was plenty of packed snow on the road.
then it got worse.
Fortunately, Polk County road crews had continued their fight through the night to keep the Falls City-Valsetz road passable.
Terry talked faster than he drove, which was fine with me.
Ever then at times we were inches away from the wall of snow on my side of the cab.
The 63 -Year Terry has been making the Valsetz mail (and milk run) for ten years. Seldom is the snow problem worse than it was with up to three feet of snow where the road crest the Coast Range at 2,300 feet.
Heavy snow on trees and the banks piled up by the snow-plows added to the visibility problem on the winding, narrow road
"we're safe until we get to the next corner, now," Terry said several times after craning his neck to see if anyone was coming from the other way.
There's a basic philosophy behind Terry's careful driving;His assertion that "I don't want to die on this mountain; I'm not in love with it," sums it up.
As the most regular driver over the 25 miles from Dallas, Terry is the expert on "the Hill." Everybody ask him how the road is and how deep the snow is.
Often his daily routine is broken by an unwary motorist in need of help, chains,or gasoline, or a ride one way or other. "I loaned my spare chains and didn't get them back. I loaned my spare can of gasoline and
didn't get it back. I don't do it any more," he sighed.
We had a passenger on the return trip. Room was made for a slender Valsetz youth on his way to Dallas to see a doctor about a broken finger.
On the way he smilingly told of another young man who rode over "the hill" with him on his way to duty in the South Pacific. The soldier wrote his father later saying he believed it was safer in Vietnam than riding out that hill.
While Terry is willing to leave the Moon and Mars to a younger generation
, he's given some thought to modernizing the Valsetz mail run. When I suggested that a helicopter would be just the ticket, he quickly replied: "I'm studying on it."
It was just 12:30 p.m. when he pulled back into the Dallas Post Office parking lot. Folks at Falls City and Valsetz had their mail again, as usual. And the kids at Valsetz and Falls City had their milk for lunch.
