Tag: summers in Rangeley

Weather…or NOT!

Joy Clough4 Comments

I’m not sure who the audience is supposed to be for most National Weather Service “special advisories” in my area. Especially this one:

Special Weather Statement for Northern Franklin County (June 15): The warm air temperatures this weekend in the 70s and lower 80s may cause people to underestimate the dangers of the cold water temperatures, which are currently only in the mid 50s. The cold water temperatures can quickly cause hypothermia to anyone immersed in the water when the water temperature is below 60 degrees. The average submerged person could lose dexterity within minutes and be unable to accomplish simple tasks. Anyone on small boats, canoes, or kayaks should plan accordingly if recreating this weekend and use extreme caution to avoid this threat.

It was the real deal, dominating the online weather forecast with so many capital letters and exclamatory symbols it might as well have been an all-points bulletin about a serial killer on the loose or an SOS to all ships at sea.

“Seriously?” I said. Sitting there in my shorts, all-season fleece jacket and slipper socks, I got the feeling that whomever the national weather authorities thought they needed to alert, they weren’t from around here.

As a seasoned Rangeley resident, I know that May typically translates to “May I please put away my hat and gloves a few days before my Memorial Day cookout?” Then comes June-uary when, even if I get a few of those almost-summer teaser days, I’m not gonna dig out my bathing suit anytime soon. And I’m certainly not gonna go and immerse myself yet. Not intentionally, anyways.

Coming up to Rangeley and places like it as a kid, I used to intentionally immerse myself in the lake as soon after ice-out as possible. I didn’t have AccuWeather radar or emergency bulletins to warn me not to “underestimate the danger.” I didn’t even have the sense that God gave geese. But I had my Dad, standing on the dock as I cannon balled past him, hollering something about being a numb skull and going into cardiac arrest. I could barely hear him, though, with the cold, cold water closing over me, making my heart nearly stop and my head go numb.

It didn’t take too many summers for me to realize why waders and wet suits were popular things. And why my parents waited for those rare 90-degree days to do the Mom and Dad swim-shuffle up to their waists and back to shore. Not because they were old. Because they were wise.

Before my Big Move to Rangeley, I used to pay pretty good attention to winter weather advisories. That’s because doing so could grant me official National Weather Service permission to “work at home” instead of slip-sliding down the turnpike to spend eight hours in an office cubicle. It could also clue me in to an ensuing snow day. That way, I’d keep one eye open the next morning for the best weather-related “news you can use” in a house with teenagers and a teacher husband—the list of school closures. When our town finally scrolled across the TV screen, I’d authoritatively announce that they could all stay in bed and shuffle back there myself.

Out here, though—especially during the Never Ending Winter of 2019—I barely bat an eye. Seeing a generic weather “statement” is kinda like when I’m sliding into a 180 in the Subaru and the little red squiggly icon flashes on the dash to tell me, officially, that my road surface is frozen and I need to exercise caution. Ya think? Geez, so glad I got that super helpful validation so I wouldn’t be befuddled and skidding toward a snowbank at the same time!

Who needs to click on the little red exclamation banner across the daily Rangeley forecast to read the painfully obvious? Not me. Something about having snow piled past your window sills imparts an innate sense of knowing. Nor’easter coming? Got it. Freezing rain turning to snow to rain then back again? Been there, doin’ that. Even on the days I try to ignore what’s all around me, a few steps off the back porch keeps me up to the minute on current conditions in my area.

Yup, after ten winters and almost-summers on the Big Lake, I instinctively already know. Or if I don’t—promptly and precisely—I act as if I do. Meaning I assume I’m gonna need a Gor-Tex coat, a few layers of fleece, socks up to my knees, waterproof gloves, all-terrain footwear, three different hats, tear-away pants, an umbrella, a shovel, a couple flares and a cell phone, even if the only coverage I might get is with the flashlight app.

Try as they might to encapsulate my local weather into a one or two-line forecast, the nerds at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) hardly ever hit it right. That’s because—to borrow an analogy from my software development tech writing days—it’s like nailing Jello to a tree. There are just too many ever-changing variables to squish into a blanket statement. Mountain currents, lake effects, you name it. Efforts at articulation usually end up with too little too late or somewhere in La La Land.

It’s still a fun guessing game, though, logging on to look, getting the meteorological low-down on what I can see coming across Bemis from town, or what the really big Great Lakes are supposedly sending my way. Then I concur with Tom, my resident Joe Cupo, and try to plan accordingly. Most days, it goes something like this.

Me: What’s NOAA saying about today’s weather and the possibility of outside activities? (I pronounce it Noah, with Biblical intonation).

Tom (on his NOAA-defaulted laptop): It’s fine if you don’t mind getting wet.

Substitute wet with frost bitten, wind blown, dusty and/or burnt and I pretty much have my custom, regional AccuWeather forecast.

Unless, of course, I’m on vacation—down the mountain for a tropical mud season break. Now that really ratchets up the entertainment value of looking at the Rangeley forecast! I read the special weather advisories out loud, sometimes hourly. And for even more giggles, I check out the live action on the Bald Mountain Camps web cam, just making sure how much snow, sleet or other fun stuff is getting dumped on my frozen lakefront back home. It doesn’t change a thing I’m doing. Except a little barefoot happy dance before I intentionally immerse myself in the warm, warm water.

Mother’s Day anniversaries

Joy CloughLeave a comment

For more than 20 years, Mother’s Day meant time to go back “upta camp” to rake the leaves, dust off the cobwebs, and watch the lake warm up before declaring it summer-ready and heading back to New Hampshire. Time for my girls to bestow their annual, handmade Pine Tree Frosty gift coupon/card and whatever trinket their allowances allowed, even though I told them to save their money.

“Mumma doesn’t need things,” I’d insist. Being with my family, happy and healthy, and back in Rangeley, was the best possible gift. As my pile of un-cashed ice cream vouchers grew, so did my memories of this fleeting weekend in early May when the promise of warm days by the lake stretched ahead like a mirage. Inevitably school, work, and my maternal duties in my “regular” house crept back into focus so that, by mid-summer, I’d be grounded in truth: I was a split-personality mother leading a seasonal dual existence. My family’s residence—a house with more space but a lot less charm—was three and a half hours away from our true home, our real base camp in Rangeley.

On Mother’s Day 2010, I made a colossal liar out of myself. Sitting in my Adirondack chair watching the lake “turn over” from another winter, I wasn’t the least bit remorseful, though. I’d come to find out there was an even better best possible gift for Mumma. Being right here with my family, happy and healthy, and staying here was all I ever needed and then some. Beginning with that one monumental weekend, I did not need to pack and head for “home” as soon as I got settled in. I was home—for good—a bona fide year-round Rangeley resident! Faith, family, determination, and a touch of insanity bought me my fairy tale. My life was consolidated, my pared-down possessions tucked snugly in my now-just-big-enough cabin. With home base and its newly-added upper stories peeking out of the birch boughs behind me, I faced the lake and let my head align with my heart. I could stay put now way past “camp closing” time, to see the big lake ice over again, to be there still for the next spring turning. “Priceless,” I said, and gave myself a big motherly hug.

This Mother’s Day weekend marks four years since my Big Move. Just before I pulled the plug on my old life (and my higher-speed Internet connection) and left New Hampshire for the last time, I posted the following thank-you note on Facebook:

I will be celebrating Mother’s Day in my “new” home by the lake, sending love to everyone who made the dream possible. To my three mothers….Mum, who gave me life and who shows me every day how love lives on in Spirit; to Prudy, my step-Mom, who helped me love myself as a grown woman while seeing the wonder in all things; and to Ruth, my Mother-in-Law, who taught me just in time, the healing power of unconditional love. To my beautiful, strong, funny, amazing daughters, Helen and Becky, who mother me back, but keep me young at heart and always eager for adventure. (Thank you for chosing me in this lifetime!) And, of course, to Tom, my husband and forever friend. Thank you for the courage to take this free fall, for the wisdom and common sense to bring our “craziness” into the realm of possibility, for keeping my feet on the ground and my head in the clouds, for laughing with me and loving me all ways, and for always  just being with me by our big, beautiful lake.

I’m still saying thanks every day since I wrote that. I thank my three mothers in Heaven for bringing me, collectively and in their own separate ways, to where I am today. I thank my daughters—for knowing I don’t need things because letting me scream like a 10-year-old with them on a mega-coaster or a whitewater raft is better than any trinket. I thank Tom, my best friend, for building this life around me and still wanting to share it with me, even through the long, cold Rangeley winters. I thank my girl friends, my soul sisters, who nurture me like mothers, and love me unconditionally for who I really am. I thank my work family, for enabling me continue my financial security out here in the woods, for helping me prove to myself and the rest of the traditional business world that earning money is just as much of a blessing as having the freedom and the enthusiasm to enjoy spending it. And, more than ever on this Mother’s Day, I thank myself, for just plain being—here and now—hugging myself in my camp chair, at peace with all that I have and have lost.

Forty years ago, I thought my joyful Mother’s Days were over. I’d proudly bought my mother a set of stoneware salt and pepper shakers with some of my $1.80-an-hour paycheck, even though she’d told me to save my money. “As long as you’re happy, I don’t really need things,” she said. “But thanks honey, they’re lovely.” Grinning, she set them in the dining room hutch for “special company.” Fortunately (and unfortunately) I had no way of knowing that was to be our last Mother’s Day. I was 17, madly in love with Tom, getting ready to graduate high school and head into my “best summer ever.” Mum died suddenly a couple months later, leaving me to stare angrily at the salt and pepper shakers and all the nick-knack gifts I’d given her that seemed so hollow. Happy? If happiness was what she really wanted for me, from me, how come she’d just taken all hope of it away with her forever?

But neither did I know then that mother-daughter chats wouldn’t stop, that the wisdom and support would come to find a different, more powerful, communication channel. I didn’t know then that, today, I’d be so relaxed in my camp chair, a mother of two grown women myself, surrounded by what I choose to bring into focus, nurtured by laughter and love that never dies. Happy. Blessed. Rooted in Rangeley—with a huge stack of coupons to the Pine Tree Frosty yet to be cashed.

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For more Mother’s Day messages, see: