Wednesday morning, the world, usually pitch black at 6am, possesed a curious phosphoresence. Overnight, the first snow of the season had transformed the typical early morning colors into what seemed like the stage of the Nutcracker. The world felt fresher, the oxygen breathed more richly. Consumed by this magic, my mind reverted back to my childhood. I felt that old familiar pang of excitement over a possible school cancellation.

This school boy abandon quickly fled once I noticed my driveway buried in two feet of snow. That meant work for me. The winter version of the Biblical flood had hit Columbus, and unfortunately, someone needed to shovel. If only I had a snow shovel…

Unfortunately, I didn’t own one. If I remembered right, this was the same problem I had last winter. One measly blizzard last March, and the snow shovel shortage of the century suddenly swept the state. Lowe’s, Home Depot, Walmart - none had them in stock. I never checked, but I bet they were going on Ebay for roughly the same price as Ohio State/Michigan tickets. Store clerks laughed in my face when I asked them to direct me to the snow shovel department.

“Will any of your other locations have ‘em?” I’d ask.

“You can try,” they answered, with a tsk-tsk-tsk-like air.

I swore this would never happen to me again. Next time I’d be first in line. I’d buy mine in June. But summer came and the heat of the days made any thoughts of snow vanish. By the time fall rolled around, I’d stroll carelessly by rows of shovels at Lowe’s. There are so many; they won’t run out. Plus it’s not near snowy or wintry enough to buy one now. Maybe next week. There’s time - duped by the universal lie. To make a long story short, I never bought one.

Well, now I was paying for it. After slipping back and forth to work in my tiny Ford front-wheel drive, and after taking a series of spills in the work parking lot, straining a groin muscle, I decided to use my lunch break to finally go buy a snow shovel.

I went to Lowe’s. I Tracked through the dirty parking lot slush and slidding doors with damp pant bottoms. Wasting no time, I made a beeline for the nearest red-vested Lowe’s employee. In an aisle of snow blowers, she worked hard punching buttons on a hand-held electronic device. It resembled a chintzy, Dr. Who laser gun.

“Excuse me,” I asked, using my sorry-to-trouble-you voice. “But do you know where I can find the snow shovels?”

“All we have is in front where you walk in,” she said, still operating the Dr. Who gun. It made a beep.

Unable to remember, I probably uttered a weak joke to cover the embarrassement of having just walked right by them on my way in. I thanked her for her detailed directions and made my way over to the limbo part of the store located between the outdoor and indoor entrances. Inside, every step tripped one or both of the automatic sliding doors. I searched the area for shovels while the doors slid frantically on their rails. Open, close; open, close.  

Finally, a cardboard box of plastic handles near the indoor entrance attracted my attention. ”Snow Shovels - $20″ was scrawled in permanent market on a sign. I held my breath and gained a better look at what appeared to be sand shovels.       

Surely this isn’t all they have, I thought. The Dr. Who woman made a mistake. These aren’t even two feet long, and would easily snap under the pressure of a full load of snow. What’s the point.

As if trapped in a horror movie, I took flight for the nearest Lowe’s employee. Barely able to restrain from snatching two fists full of his red vest and demanding to know if the sand shovels were their idea of some sick joke, I calmed down just enough to ask him if that’s all they had.

“Yup,” he said, with his quality customer service mock sympathy. “We ran out earlier today.”

“Will you be getting more in?” I asked.

“I hope so,” was the only help he offered.

I tromped back to my car through the slushy parking lot, defeated, angry that I lived in a world where kiddie sand shovels could be sold for snow shovels - for $20. Later that day I found out that the weekend was suppossed to bring warm weather. This brought some relief. I would only be the neighborhood slob for a day or two, until the snow melted. And as the work day ended and I headed back home on the cleared roads, I thoroughly convinced myself that I will never let this happen to me again.        

Categories: Life, Nature, Shopping