Want to hear a funny story? I don't think it's very funny for obvious reasons, but you (the reader) may enjoy the irony and the sadness to the humor within it. Well ... I'll tell you the story and you can decide whether or not you feel my pain or if you wish to just do what I do now ... (medication helps) laugh at it and shake your head in disbelief.
It all started years ago when I bought my first house. A beautiful little log cabin on a rather large and modest parcel of wooded land. I was in awe of my purchase. Nestled in the woods on a dirt road across from a 100 acred horse farm, the quiet and serenity took a while to get used to ... since I moved there from living in a Manchester apartment for the past couple of previous years. I was so ready to get out of the apartment living scene where you share parking lots and population noises and hard of hearing neighbors and are limited to making your own level of noise when you want to. I went from one side of the spectrum to the other with the purchase of the house. There were maybe seven houses on the road when I bought the cabin. Bordering two towns, it ran a meandering mile and a half of unpaved dirt that demanded year round maintenance that anyone ever living on a dirt road can appreciate. To me, it was my dream house.
As eager as I was to move into my own house ... let alone a log cabin in the woods ... and as ready as I thought I was to be a homeowner, I was about to get a fully blown open case of reality. Yard maintenance. I had all this money back then from my savings and middle management income and yet all I bought to battle the first summer and winter was a small 20" push mower and a very large snow blower. The biggest, baddest, most expensive model that Home Depot had to offer. It was over $1000 and it had reverse and three forward speeds. You almost needed a to pass a course and become certified to operate the darn thing. After the first summer and pushing the 20" mower over two open acres, I was ready to battle the smaller landscape of the unpaved driveway with a much larger machine and take winter on full force. Silly me.
After the first major storm ... I remember it like it was yesterday ... my time, the New England Patriots were playing at 4 in the afternoon and I went outside at 7 AM and saw the devastation. Over a foot of snow. But not the fluffy and easy to shovel variety of snow. It was granulized. There was a heavy, frozen consistency to it. And it was very cumbersome and difficult to move. I sparked up the snowblower unafraid. I shifted into the first gear and moved the shovel of the behemoth into the snow and waited to watch it throw the snow over thirty feet into the woods. Except that's not exactly what happened. The snow purging from the chute was barely flying over the height of the handles of the snowblower itself and within 30 seconds, it clogged the chute entirely. And I hadn't even gone three feet into the driveway. Well ... this cannot be how it is going to be, I thought to myself. After an hour of trying to angle the girth of the snowblower in different directions and stopping to unclog the chute about 17 times, I realized that I was shoveling my 100 yard long dirt driveway with a 200 pound shovel and I was losing this first round of war Old Man Winter had waged on me for no apparent reason whatsoever. After all, as a renter for years, I would relish the fact of winter and I engaged in all types of winter activities. I used to look forward to winter ... until that year of 1995 ... and every winter since. I gave up on the idea of the snowblower and grabbed a shovel. Looking bleakly at the long, unforgiving driveway, I realized by noon, that sitting down in front of the television in time for kick-off was severely threatened. By 3:45 in the afternoon, a neighbor who I had not really been formally introduced to, drove by and noticed my situation and saw me shoveling. I was about half way down the driveway at this point. He stopped and pulled in and asked if I wanted him to push the remainder forward with the plow on the front of his truck. At that point, I was willing to do anything for this act of chivalry ... I'd reshingle the roof to his house for free ... mow his lawn in the summer ... trim and file his toenails ... anything. Nothing was required. It was a simple act of friendly neighborhood etiquette. He pushed the snow forward and I was sitting in front of the TV with a beer in hand watching the third year quarterback Drew Bledsoe and the Patriots undoubtedly screw up a half time lead. All for naught, but I've been a Patriots fan for a long, long time.
The second storm of the year was a little more forgiving and I realized that the consistency of the snow dictated how to manage the snow. There were going to be times that the snowblower would simply not do ... unless I was able to be home and fight the tempest every couple of hours for the entire duration of it. Which we all know from the working world, is not entirely possible. There is, after all, no storm in the world mightier than the Almighty American Dollar. Businesses stay open now because people venture out in them now. Remember the great storm of '77/'78? Stores closed. Schools closed. People made do. Not anymore. Times have changed and so have Blue Laws. In God We Trust it says on the American currency ... and that in and of itself is the irony ... but a tale for another time.
After that winter was over and another summer of pushing that stupid 20" lawnmower around in 80 and 90 degree humidity, I realized that it was time for something new. Something that could handle the volume of the lawn and plow the driveway in the winter. Did they even make such a machine? Give me a break ... let's remember this is only my second year of being a homeowner. A John Deere tractor. I noticed one in the garage of this very house I now lived in ... owned by the two ladies who liked each other I bought it from. Of course. How stupid was I being? I needed a tractor. So I started calling around. They wanted how much for a John Deere? A college education AND my first born child? Holy mother of some guy named Pete! Okay ... I had to do some more research. Certainly there had to be a quality tractor out there that could do the same job for less money. I could buy a car for the amount of money John Deere wanted for a garden tractor. After hemming and hawing for a while, I discovered the Massey Ferguson. The exact same model with the exact same Briggs and Stratton motor in it cost $6000 more to be painted John Deere green and yellow. My Massey Ferguson was reddish orange. Will all the winter and summer amenities, it was delivered in a snowstorm all put together and I used it and it worked marvelously ... for only $10,000.00. The second time I went to use it however ... I remember it like it was yesterday. It was Christmas Eve. We closed a couple hours early from work and despite that, after the nasty travelling conditions, by the time I arrived home, I needed low range four wheel drive to get my truck up and into my driveway. Something deep and sinister in the back of my mind told me I was going to challenge the complete crap out of my Massey Ferguson. Oh yeah. Indeed. I couldn't handle the machine whatsoever. A couple of feet forward. Stuck and spinning. Back up. Drop the blade (the salesman had asked if I wanted the snowblower attachment for the front of the tractor, but after the initial winter, I opted for the blade) and push forward again ... six inches. Hmmm ... I realized after a couple of hours of this ... I was shovelling my driveway with a 600 pound shovel. You gotta be kidding me? Eight hours later, I had a rabbit trail cleared herring bone style to the end of my driveway and it took me three more days of four and five hour shifts to move the rest of it back and widen. The equation was simple enough. In order to battle the storm, I had to be home for it and not let it get ahead of me. Until I got the tractor stuck ... three times in one plowing. Then the front tire spun off the rim flat. All the repairs were done in the driveway ... in the snow ... in the elements outside of my control.
I used the tractor to the best of its ability ... it mowed the lawn marvelously ... until it was six months beyond its warranty. I was plowing and I had just been out in the road and I was pushing it up my driveway ... not a lot ... it was manageable enough ... and suddenly the tractor stopped dead in its tracks and I was unable to steer it. You gotta be kidding me? I got off and looked at the front tires which were awkwardly and precariously misplaced ... and then I noticed the front axle had completely collapsed under the tractor. You have GOT to be kidding me? I called the place I bought it and they came out to pick it up to make repairs on it. I complained that I use it to plow and mow and perhaps I'd let a couple storms get ahead of me from time to time ... but it WAS a plow and designed for this type of beating ... wasn't it? The salesman-slash-owner assured me it was not being over-used and that it was the correct model that HE sold me to perform the job that I needed. Until he gave me the bill to fix the front axle. I asked him if he had spoken to Massey Ferguson and he said he had and they said I was abusing the tractor. Over-using it, was the term they used. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders almost apologetically like it was out of his hands. I assured him that it was indeed out of his hands now ... because I had the money to upgrade to a bucket if need be ... but due to his dishonestly and obvious lack of knowledge to the product he had been selling for the last 30 years, he wasn't getting another dime out of my pocket. See ya later, alligator.
So, I got home and pondered. What haven't I tried to battle winter? A plow for my Toyota Tacoma. I really didn't want to put a plow on my truck. But they make those "Minute Mounts" now that pop on and pop off in a minute! Yeah ... if you have a paved driveway or a garage big and deep enough to keep it covered all year round, maybe. The following winter, I decided it was time to give it a try. I reluctantly put a $3000.00 "Minute Mount" electric Fisher Plow on my truck. There's no torsion bars on the Tacoma's of that year. The plow fully raised hung two and one half inches above the ground. Driving it home after it was installed, I encountered a head-on collision with every frost heave in the road. Nonetheless ... it worked out okay for that winter. Well ... sort of. The minute to mount it took more like a half hour to 45 minutes. The jack to level the plow would sink and rise on the thawing and refreezing ground creating a new height for the truck to adjust to every time I tried to put it on for a new storm. Four letter curse words and floor jacks, breaking bars and hammers, snow shovels and more four letter curse words ... and then finally, I'd manage to get the plow on ... in a lot more time than a minute. Then, I'd plow and be done so quickly that I'd actually be in denial and would shovel some areas of the yard to to remind myself that it was still winter and I was still at war. The next time I had to mount the plow would remind me all too well of the small battles waged in my direction.
I decided to leave the plow on my truck one impending storm and I used the truck to go to work that day. I couldn't get out of my own way and the plow ran into everything along the road. I was actually plowing the state and city roads, although my plow was all the way up, with my little Toyota Tacoma. You've got to be kidding me! This would not do. By Spring of that year, I realized the extent of the damage the plow and the winter had done to my poor, beautiful little truck. Two snapped leaf springs on each side in the rear, two front blown shock absorbers, two severely worn and cupped front tires. Okay ... so working in a auto repair shop, me and the boys made changes to the truck. We added an extra leaf spring for each side of the rear axle. We replaced the front coil over shocks and placed rubber coil spacers in the front coils to lift the front end. We replaced all four tires and jumped up a couple of sizes ... all to lift the truck and bring the plow up more off the ground. Now ... after $2500 in parts and labor, the plow was four inches off the ground fully raised instead of the two and a half inches like before. And that worked well enough ... for a while, that is.
After a couple years we decided to sell our beloved log cabin. I met a lovely young lady, fell madly in love, got married, and had a child with her at the ripe young age of 39. Realizing that the cabin was not a great choice to raise an infant and due to the fact that we were so remote, we decided to sell and move north to the Great North Woods of New Hampshire. Where winter is nine months long and the other three months is just bad snowmobiling with black flies. Go figure.
The house we ended up buying was a smaller house on a much smaller yard and although I knew I was going to miss the seclusion of the woods and the large yard we had, I was also breathing a sigh of relief that my outdoor maintenance was going to be trimmed down to a fraction of what it had been at the cabin. Or ... so I thought. At the end of the first winter, the plow for my truck, barely three years old now, stopped working properly. I was performing all the maintenance scheduled recommendations and changing the hydraulic oil and all that ... I had already encountered a blown hydraulic line during one storm ... which incidentally, cripples the plow immediately. But the plow itself wasn't responding correctly to the commands I was sending it on the electric joy stick. A brief investigation would lead to the discovery that the plug for the three-point plug-in harness had a cracked wire. Why? Well ... every time you plug and unplug the darn thing in ... remember this us usually done during a snow storm when it's very cold out and the wires are brittle from the elements beyond our control ... it would bend and compromise the wires. On this particular plug, there were only three wires which made it susceptible to being much more delicate and vulnerable than the other plug. So ... what I probably should have done was ordered a new three point wiring harness and installed it ... but let's remember two things ... the first is; there's a storm going on and I don't have time to wait for this thing to be delivered via Internet ordering and delivery ... AND the second thing is; I'm a Yankee so there HAS to be a way to not only fix this, but make it better. Am I right? Looking at the results of that winter, I would beg to challenge that statement. I rewired the plow and for the most part, it worked ... alright ... when it wanted to. Taking on an electrical mind of its own almost as if it were a possessed hunk of metal and machinery like Stephen King's tale Christine, it served its sole purpose for the remainder of that winter. Not entirely satisfied with my wiring schematics, however, I decided to re-do the job in the summer months when it was much warmer and the elements outside of our control were a bit more hospitable. Almost anticipating winter and trying to speed the rest of that summer up so I could see how well it would perform, I was aghast to find out the darn thing wouldn't work at all come the first calling of its name that year. I was relinquished to the snow blower and shovel. I got it working a couple of times that winter, but it began to get deeper and deeper into a snow bank that rendered it a harbinger of Spring. Like the frozen dog poop that melted and refroze in the icy landscape of the back yard. See ya in April ... maybe.
So ... after working on the plow all summer long this past year ... okay ... it really wasn't all summer long ... it was actually one day and after I rewired it and got a new plug (not the recommended three-point harness which would have undoubtedly given me a couple more years of trouble free use) and attached it to the truck and ... nothing. Not even a moan from the electric motor. I fidgeted with this and that. Unplugged the ground wire and cleaned the terminal. The plow raised and I was pleased. "Yes! Alright!" I hollered to the Plow Gods. Phew. I put it back down and hit the joy stick command to raise it again and ... nothing. You have got to be kidding me! And it hasn't worked since. I had visions of loading it in my truck and bringing it to work ... or just chuck it out in the Androscoggin River along the way ... and trying to fix it, but in all honesty ... it beat me. It won hands down and I gave up. I just gave up. A project for some other day this new year ... maybe.
And then this winter has been unforgiving. I turned my Massey Ferguson tractor back into a plow. Something I haven't done since I bought the plow for the truck. I got everything completed in time for winter. I got the snowblower running, the tractor converted over and ready to go, the generator was cranked up and running ... I was so ready for winter this year ... except the Massey Ferguson wouldn't start each time I went to use it. I replaced the battery with a higher cold cranking amp kind. Nothing. I would use the battery charger on it ... finally get it going ... and then use it and the next time I went to start it ... nothing. The alternator is underneath the crank on this model. I have to pull the top end of the motor off to get to it. I'm not doing that when the high temperature for this time of year is a balmy 30 degrees. Today, this morning, it's -14 degrees Fahrenheit. Yeah ... and the tractor is parked in the woodshed and completely submerged in a giant snow bank. I simply gave up on it. You've got to be kidding me.
Then there was that storm. I remember it like it was yesterday. It WAS yesterday! I was snow-blowing around the tiptop of my Minute Mount Fisher snow plow. The height of the snow banks were challenging the fully erect chute of the blower ... the amount of snow is threatening to gobble the entire girth of the seven foot plow completely up ... I looked out in the back yard at the giant mountain of snow blocking the woodshed where the tractor is parked unusable ... I went to the end of the driveway where the big plow trucks push the road ingredients four feet back into my driveway ... after I just plowed the end ... and the snow is a consistency that quickly reminds my snowblower that it can and will be challenged often in its lifetime ... and I resort to the age old invention that man has been using long before snow plows and snow blowers and tractors and other machinery and electrical-slash-hydraulic devices to battle the elements ... outside our control ... the shovel. Chopping into the road debris with the blade of the shovel ... the snowblower was running next to me wasting precious gasoline ... but I didn't feel like re-crank starting it ... I pondered the amount of money I have invested into battling the war waged against me when Old Man Winter bumps uglies with Mother Nature and I have to clean the sheets up after them ... $16,500.00! A snowblower that works only in ideal snow conditions and consistency ... a tractor that only plows and starts when the conditions are ideal and a magical wrench is waved ... an electrical Minute Mount Fisher plow that takes a lot more than a minute to install and now only works in the summer ... once ... and may never work again ... (plus the money I had to invest in my truck to beef it up in order to manage the plow after the first winter) and they're all ganging up on me and mocking me as I chop the blade of the shovel into the snow and chuck it over the snowbank which is now way above my head. What in the name of the mother of a guy named Pete did I ever do to Old Man Winter and Mother Nature to make them hate me so much?
Jody L. Campbell
