TWICE IS NICE

Snow is no big concern here in Maine.  When a Nor’easter barrels up the coast, we pull on our plaid flannels and settle in with a best seller. If an Alberta Clipper threatens, we put a pot roast in the all-day-cooker and a log in the fireplace.

Our front porches are piled high with aged firewood. Industrial-size containers of Road Runner Ice Melt sit on the front step. We wear ten-inch-thick LLBean PrimaLoft jackets to ward off Nome-like temps while walking the dog.  Plus, the Maine Highway Department scrapes most roads clean before the flakes stop falling.

Snow, schnow. 

Unless someone has an appointment for HER second vaccination.  Game changer.

Three weeks ago, I left the Maine Health Clinic in Westbrook, 30 miles north and adjacent to Portland, happily clutching an appointment card for my second Pfizer inoculation on February 22. Now I could plan the rest of my life!

The minute I arrived home, I made a JetBlue reservation from Boston to Fort Myers so I could join Mr. Wonderful in our rental condo. He’d left after getting his second shot and was already losing golf balls like crazy. “I’ll be there in three weeks,” I told him. 

I also started checking the long-range weather forecast. Not that I’m a Twitchy Tillie but … my iPhone does has four helpful apps: Weather, DarkSky, the Weather Channel and AccuWeather.  Every day ahead looked “okay” except February 22, Shot Day. “50% chance of snow.”  The tension meter inched upwards.

A week later: “70% chance of snow.” Two days before my shot: “90% chance of heavy snow starting at 2 PM and lasting until 10.”  My appointment was at 4:10, the heart of the deluge.

I started envisioning myself rounding a bend in Saco and sliding off into an icy abyss.  I reminded myself: I own a four-wheel-drive Subaru, the workhorse of Maine. I can call Uber or even beg our handyman Fez to drive me there in his big old honking pickup truck. I knew this: I was not throwing away my shot, thank you, Lin-Manuel Miranda.

February 22 dawned with snow predicted for early afternoon, then  increase to 100% by 4 PM and taper off to sleet around 8. I spent most of the morning gazing up at the grey sky, looking for flakes, and suddenly decided: What the heck.

I grabbed two bottles of SmartWater (highly recommended to ease side effects, I’d been told) and drove north to Westbrook. When I arrived at the clinic at 1 PM, snow was blanketing my windshield.

I walked to the clinic entrance and spoke with the thermometer lady. “I’m three hours early but panicked about the snow, I live 30 miles south, I’m 78 and I’m trying not to be pushy but…..” She nodded, smiled, and said, “I completely understand. Wait right here.”

Within five minutes I was sitting in a booth, swearing that I didn’t have Covid, had never had Covid, yadda. yadda. I got the vaccination and, after waiting the required 15 minutes, walked around thanking anyone who made eye contact, including those waiting in line. 

And as I drove home on the plowed Maine Turnpike, at 1:30 PM, I thought: YOU JERSEY WUSS! 

——But tomorrow: Bonita Springs!