On Shoveling and other such things

"Hey! I shoveled snow for the first time today!" I said to my Dad.
"Wow. You've lived a pretty sheltered life," he said.
I looked at him ready to make an argument, to prove I'm not sheltered. But before I could, he continued: "Twenty five and shoveled snow for the first time in your life."

But I haven't lived a sheltered life, right? I went off to school in Indiana, four hours away from home. Then, more outrageously, I went down into the middle of Mexico for a year. Then to Denver, and now to Tucson all on my own. Not, exactly, the definition of sheltered in my mind.

I mean, I just haven't shoveled snow before. That's all. Or is it?

There are many things I have yet to learn and experience. What I have in mind, as with this project, are learning new things with my hands. And shoveling snow is a new one to add to my list and subsequently check off.

I did it.

Wow, you may be saying. You shoveled snow. Woopdedoo.

And you're probably right. I mean, just about everyone has shoveled snow before, right?

The experience itself is an interesting one, a unique one. You have to bundle up, layer up, boot up, glove up. You're head-to-toe in warm cottons that will soon get wet and messy. One thing I don't like about winter and snow, is the getting all messy part. I feel like I'm in constant need of a shower.

Thankfully, my parents own a heavy-duty forest green shovel. It's one of those ultra-wide shovels, so, in essence, you really don't have to do much shoveling at all. You really just kind of have to be able to push the snow. In a way, it's almost like you're mowing the lawn. Vrooom, Vroom. Glide that baby from left to right. Once you push all that snow over to the side, scoop up, (shovel!) up as much as you can. Then go back again and get the left-overs, the snow that fell behind, that couldn't fit it's hips on the shovel. Do this about fifty more times.

This process is actually quite satisfying...once you see that you're making progress. And, if you have OCD, like I mildly do, it's not one of those things you can really start and not finish. And why would you want too? I mean, what would the neighbors' think?

For the first time, I got the feeling of suburban guilt that I think many suburbanites experience or have experienced. I felt this when I was contemplating whether or not to shovel the sidewalk. I looked to the right of my parents' house, and noticed that the Jacobi's and the Boka's had both shoveled their sidewalks. I looked to the left, and noticed that my Aunt Debbie (who's my Mom's sister and next-door-neighbor), had also sweeped clean hers. Then I looked a little farther on, some people...didn't. Shame. It's like when I'd go for walks with my parents in the summer, and they'd always point out who didn't mow their lawn. Oh--the shame.

And why exactly? Why are suburbanities so worried about keeping a good front yard? Is it because we live in such close quarters, these side-by-side pueblos, that the non-shoveled sidewalk is equivalent to keeping a messy room?

Or is it just that suburbanites like things...clean?

My Mom had read over some of my blogs recently, and noticed that I used bad words occasionally.

"You shouldn't do that," she said. "You offend people, and people won't want to read that."

"Some people like to read that," I counter-pointed.

"Well..." she trailed off and gave a disappointed, defeated glance. I give up, it read.

One of the last things I want to do in my writing is to offend people, but it seems, isn't it almost impossible not to do that? I mean, this would mean I'd have to write like an angel. And that's not who I am. Nobody is. At some point, we have to offend...someone.

Before I went home for winter break, the Craft class I took went to Brunch as and end of the year wrap up thingie. One of the concerns I had with writing was the fact that I didn't want to offend my family. I even said, "I've always had this romantic vision that I would write something that my family would like. Something that they could show their friends, and friends of their friends. Something that an artsy crowd, like us here, could appreciate, but also a more mainstream crowd could as well."

The other students looked at me--well, I really don't know how they looked at me, I was looking down--without a word, but my teacher simply said: "I really don't think you should care what your parents think."

But we do though, don't we? I do. That's why I shoveled that driveway. To prove something to them, to prove something to myself. That's why I write, too: to prove something to them, to prove something to myself. I. Can. Do. This. Watch me.

"You did a great job on that driveway, Allie," both of my parents would tell me later that day.

Why is it, even as we get older, that we're still looking for praise and gratification from our parents? I'd say it's because we want proof that we're being useful in the world. That we matter. That we're needed. And, I think that's something that everyone wants to know once in awhile.