This past weekend, we got a serious blizzard in Wisconsin. I really haven’t seen a storm this bad for at least a few years.
It started snowing early on Friday morning and didn’t stop until Saturday. With the snow came the kind of wind that tries to rip your car door off its hinges as you get into the driver’s seat. It’s weather that you really don’t want to be out in, unless you have an important errand to run (which I did).
On Friday, I took my car into town and the roads were horrendous. And then as I was driving home, my car battery decided to die on me. Just my luck!
It was actually pretty scary. The first few minutes of the drive were fine, but then all of a sudden every kind of warning light was flashing on my dashboard as I struggled to get my car through an intersection at the top of a hill. I was in the left turn lane when it stopped accelerating, and when I looked at my dashboard, the car had switched into neutral gear. Uh oh. So I flicked my hazards on and pulled the emergency brake to keep myself from rolling backwards into the driver behind me.
I dialed 911 for the first time in my life because I really didn’t know what else to do. I could have fumbled through my wallet for my AAA card, but I was actively blocking traffic and also didn’t want to sit in my car for too long in case the emergency brake failed. So I got out and stood in the median with the snow up to my ankle, wind tearing through my dress.
Luckily the cops showed up pretty quickly and helped block off the left lane while we waited for a tow truck. Ryan came to get me, and we watched as they strapped ye olde BMW to the truck bed and hauled it away to our mechanic. Sigh. I’m worried it might have some kind of electrical problem, but fingers crossed I just need a new battery or alternator. (The sooner I can swap this car out for one that’s less fussy, the better.)
My car problems definitely made this one of the more memorable winter storms I’ve experienced. I think everyone from the Midwest (and really any area that gets quite a bit of snow) has a story like this, or at least knows someone who does. Bad shit happens in bad weather, and you can’t be surprised when it happens to you.
On the flip side, sometimes winter storms can be memorable for more positive reasons. When I was growing up in Michigan, bad blizzards were just something you’d expect during winter, and my sisters and I always got a kick out of our dad’s reaction to the forecast. I kid you not, almost every time there was a storm on the way, he’d walk around the house announcing:
“It’s the STOOOORM of the CENTURY!”
So dramatic. Even though I can’t tell if we’ve actually experienced the storm of the century yet, there are several I’ve lived through that might make good candidates.
One happened when I was in middle school or early high school. I don’t remember much about it except the fact that it snowed all day and wouldn’t stop. Which happened to be particularly bad for me, personally, because there was an event that I reeeeaaally wanted to go to that night.
It was the mid-2010s and almost every girl my age was in their PINK by Victoria’s Secret era, including me. Except my parents told me they wouldn’t buy me anything at PINK; I had to save up my babysitting money and buy things myself. Booooo.
Anyway, there was a super special event at the mall where a few stores would be open after-hours for exclusive sales. PINK was one of those stores, and I was just dyyyying to go and buy my first pair of yoga pants. You know, the kind with the flare leg that said LOVE PINK on the butt. I felt like the sale was my one shot to actually get something I liked, since everything there was so overpriced.
But when the snow started falling, I began to worry. Would the event get cancelled? Would my parents even let me leave the house in this weather?
The evening crept closer, and my mom told me the news I didn’t want to hear: she wasn’t going to drive me to the mall in the snowstorm. I was pissed! I can’t remember too much about what I said or did after that, but I made it clear that I was not at all happy that I was about to miss my once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity (?) to buy mass-produced loungewear at a discount.
Eventually, I stormed up to my room (probably crying? Lol) when my dad came upstairs and knocked on the door. “Let’s go. I’ll take you in the Volvo.”
And so we set out into the blizzard after sunset. To say it was a white-knuckle ride is an understatement; we could barely see in front of us on the highway and every now and then the car would slip slightly when dad changed lanes. The snow was piling up fast. We passed many, many cars in ditches or half-buried in the snow after careening off highway entrance ramps.
Honestly, my grown-up self would not have driven to the mall in these conditions. But my younger self was so desperate for a pair of $20 yoga pants that she would have done anything to get to the mall that night (anything, meaning simply beg her parents for a ride).
Anyway, I’m sure you’ll be happy to hear that in the end I did get what I went to the mall for: a bedazzled pair of yoga pants that said LOVE PINK on the butt. And I accidentally brought a shopping tote home with me (because I honestly thought they were giving them away for free!) and felt incredibly guilty after I realized those were just for people to use in the store.
My dad was the real MVP that night. I really thought things were over for me when it came to scoring cool-girl points by buying something from PINK. Even though the whole thing was awfully frivolous, dad saw how much that sale meant to me and went the extra mile (literally) to make sure I got to do the thing I was soooo looking forward to.
But damn, we sure were lucky we got home safe after that.