Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 19, 1994 TAG: 9401200318
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Even Alaska was warm compared to Milwaukee, where the high was 2 and the low -4. Ow! And this is not to mention the dreaded wind-chill factor, which has rendered much of the Midwest as close to uninhabitable as you'd want to experience.
(Don't dwell on the numbers from Florida, where the high in Miami Beach was 77 and the low 67. Some of those poor folks probably donned sweaters before venturing out Monday night.)
And at least we don't have earthquakes.
If, however, other people's misery is cold comfort, there is little to cling to except whatever railing, tree or other stationary object you may pass as you glide down the sidewalk - that and the ever-present hope of an early spring. Till then, you'll just have to hunker down and grumble. And cope.
Surely, one thinks in anticipation of such a storm as whipped across Virginia Monday, that a thick, unbroken sheet of solid ice will bring the region to a standstill. All activity will be frozen, as if everyone were caught up in a giant children's game of "statues," until temperatures rise enough to break the icy lock. But then an overriding certainty asserts itself, that the rhythms of life will go on; and they do - albeit slower.
The slippery stuff lining steps is the most resistant to shovels our region has seen in years. Anyone who possibly can stay off the roads and - worse still - the treacherous sidewalks is wise to do so.
But if this weather doesn't kill you, you will go on living, and humanity's amazing ability to cope will keep most of us in the latter column. Hospitals will keep running, police and firefighters and other public safety workers will keep responding, society will keep functioning. Our need for each other will keep us up and running.
The plow-trucks and sand and salt don't stand up to ice and bitter, subfreezing temperatures the way they do to routine snowstorms and common cold. But they help. Workers in Roanoke who couldn't stay home found that if their snow tires and chains could get them over slick secondary streets, the main arteries were safely passable.
By midmorning Tuesday, traffic was moving through downtown Roanoke steadily, if not briskly. And on the sidewalk one man was striding along with a windowpane under one arm. Carrying a pane of glass down sidewalks still patched over with ice might be considered the act of an unbalanced person. But the man walked confidently, taking long, sure steps.
A window must have broken, and he had to replace it. It was too cold not to.
Life goes on.
by CNB