One of the most challenging aspects of any really good winter storm is the wrench that it throws in the normally mundane task of commuting. Whether commuting in car or on foot, one's normally routine commute can become an odyssey of Ulyssian magnitude when nature decides to give him the finger. When this happens to me, nature generally maintains that it is just trying to build my character. In reality, nature is the doctor's gloved finger, and I am the one who happens to have his pants down.

Now being from Kansas, and also being a twelve year immigrant to Colorado, I normally take great pride in my winter driving prowess. One of the great benefits of coming from a small prairie town is the abundance of wide open spaces. This is where I learned the intricacies of winter driving. In order to be a fully confident winter driver, one must know where the point of no return is. I'm not talking about the Kansas album, or song of the same name, for that matter. I'm talking of finding where the edge of control is and hurtling past it. Having determined that, one always knows it when he feels it and will instinctively take measures to avoid this feeling of helplessness. Sometimes, however, no amount of preparation can forestall the inevitable. Sooner or later, one will become stuck.

One such time was what we Coloradans will, with no doubt, henceforth refer to as the Blizzard of '06. It started innocently enough on a hazy Wednesday morning, December 20 th. I will concede that the weather folks were calling for a major storm. However, having lived in Colorado for a while, I have developed a tendency to poo-poo forecasts. Many times, the predicted events fail to materialize. I find that it is generally when the forecast calls for occasional flurries that I should consider hurricane-like preparation. In this particular instance, however, the meteorologists were spot on.

I made it to work without incident, as the heavy accumulation did not start until after nine. Once at work, I busied myself moving snow boots to the front of the store. In the shoe business, snow is what we call "white gold". When the white stuff flies, there are big gains to be had if the boots are easy to find. It became readily apparent by ten or so, however, that this storm was going to be everything it was advertised to be. As the snow accumulated, I was busily working the phone, coordinating the egress plan for Wednesday as well as the battle plan for Thursday. While this was going on, we were quietly doing about three times the business I thought we'd do. The battle of nature versus the procrastinating Christmas shopper is sometimes a dead heat. I was shocked that we didn't have more returns, though. For some reason, harsh storms seem to make customers experience buyers' remorse.

"Wow. You must have really wanted to return those shoes," I usually think, only rarely actually enunciating the thought. I am not exactly sure what the thought process is on the part of the customer, but I suspect it is something like this:

"Call in to work, stay at home, start a fire, and drink some hot cocoa? Naw. Call in and take those shoes that have been sitting in the closet for three weeks back to the store. I will return them today or die trying. 'She's dead, but at least she looks good' will be my epitaph."

The difficulty of my commute can be partially attributed to the aforementioned inflated ego in regards to driving. In the typical "you call this a storm?" Coloradan, laissez-faire attitude towards the challenges of winter locomotion, I cockily assured the boss (who's based in Kansas City.... get a rope...) that two in the afternoon would be a fine time to pack it in. The fact that I probably could have gotten away with noon was treading water but sinking fast in a pool of ego and testosterone.

After a very quick closing of the store and dropping off of the assistant manager, I was on the way. Having heard that highway 36, my main route home was closed, I opted for the cross town route. This was challenging but uneventful until I reached the new stretch of 120 th between Quebec and Brighton Road. The new section on this east-west road is all elevated with no wind break to speak of. Consequently, these two facts combined to produce drifts on this stretch of road roughly the height of a small horse or a large dog. Looking back, I'd say the bus stuck and stretched across the road at a forty five degree angle could have been taken as a bad omen. At this point, however, I was committed and proceeded to drive around the bus. It was then that I discovered what the bus driver no doubt had. When blowing snow drifts across the windshield and cuts visibility to zero for five to ten seconds at a time, it is all one can do to keep from filling his pants with little green apples. Luckily, I avoided soiling myself. However, I did find myself impressively stuck in a drift about twenty inches deep. Having not had the foresight to have put a snow shovel in the trunk, I tried to rock it out. I had about as much success with that as Paris Hilton would with a road side sobriety test.

It became readily apparent that no one was going to stop as that would mean getting stuck themselves. Not being more than a couple of miles from a gas station, I set out on foot. I was beginning to think I should have taken the extra minute to grab my snow boots on the way out that morning. As it was, I was braving the squall with my heavy coat, hat, and gloves up top, but only khaki's and running shoes on the bottom. They say that undescended testicles are usually a condition that a man is born with. I can say for a fact that mine were riding up somewhere near my shoulder blades during that walk. Fortunately, a kind gentleman picked me up about a quarter mile into my lonely trek. I asked if he was going to Brighton. Unfortunately, he was headed straight to the airport. I told him about the gas station, and he was kind enough to drop me there.

It was now about three or three thirty. For the next two hours, I asked every person who came into the gas station, "Are you going to Brighton?" I also spent some time on the cell phone with Judy. She had left work at around one and had gotten stuck about five miles east of me, just south of 120 th on Highway 2. She had the presence of mind to actually have her Triple A card with her and had called them. She had been waiting a couple of hours for them to come tow her out and was still waiting. At around five thirty, a man named Bill who drove a jeep came in. I asked him my usual question and was delighted to find that he was indeed going my way. He had just stopped in to pick up milk for his daughter and grandbaby that lived nearby. After making the stop at his daughter's house, Bill and I went back to my car and he towed me out. After getting to Brighton road, I found the snow was not blowing as badly and visibility was much better. I got to Highway 85 and gingerly started to make my way north. When I turned off at Bromley and made my way to my neighborhood, I found drifts about two feet deep. I shifted down and tried to stay in the closest things resembling tracks from earlier cars. Unfortunately, when I got to the corner directly in front of my house, I took it a little wide and got stuck again. With my goal in sight, I refused to be denied. I grabbed the shovel and started digging out the driveway, intending to dig all the way to the car if I had to. By a stroke of luck, my neighbor across the street, Derek, was out and scooping as well. With his help, I had the driveway cleared in about thirty minutes, we pushed the car loose, and I got it into the garage. I went into the house hoping to find Judy there, but she was not. I called her again. She said that Triple A had called and said they wouldn't be able to make it and had given her name to the police for assistance. They had not showed up and as she was about to call 911, a man asked her if she needed a ride. He dropped her of at the truck stop at highway 2 and 120 th. She had been there since about six.

I could hear the weariness in her voice and knew I needed to get her home. I decided to ask Derek, who has a 4x4, if he wouldn't mind taking me to pick her up. He readily agreed. We first helped my next door neighbor, Richard, get parked, and then the three of us went to pick up Judy. When we got to the truck stop, we found several motorists stuck near the entrance so we helped to push a lot of them in to get parked for the night. Finally, after buying and filling a five gallon gas can and putting the contents into Derek's truck, which we couldn't get to the pumps, we rescued Judy and headed home. Wet and weary, we trudged into the house at nine. After a warm shower, it was directly to bed.

Thursday morning, we got up at around seven thirty. Much to my chagrin, I looked out the window and saw no evidence of the previous night's scooping. The next several hours were spent figuring out if and when we'd be opening the store. I knew we wouldn't open, or rather, shouldn't. It just a matter of convincing the boss and researching whether any of the other retailers had enough regard for the sanctity of life to call it a day. Fortunately, reason prevailed and Judy and I had the day together. At about ten, we went outside to start scooping. Something magical happened next. Family by family, neighbor by neighbor, we all started to come outside. Each neighbor was helping the others, and in no time we had all of our driveways scooped. Derek got on his ATV and started to race up and down the streets, breaking down the snow. Then, all the guys in the four wheel drive trucks started driving the streets and packing them down to the point of being passable. It must be noted here, that the Platte River Ranch HOA and the city of Brighton have a "Gone with the Wind" attitude when it comes to plowing the residential streets. They depend on the kindness of strangers. In other words, it's a case of "It's the other guy's responsibility, not ours." I think once someone dies because emergency vehicles can't get through and they get the sued to the bejeesus belt, they'll change their tune.

By Friday afternoon, we had welcomed the sun back and found the streets passable enough to go and retrieve Judy's car before the state, in an astounding show of compassion, could tow it. All in all though, we had a lot to be thankful for. Judy and I both made it home safely. Our cars are still in tact. And we got to know our neighbors a whole lot better, too. In fact, we are planning a block party this spring or summer. I guess there are worse things that could happen than nature slapping us upside the head and telling us to stop and breathe for a minute.