603 Plowing

About 603 Plowing

Three in the morning in Nottingham, and the storm has been at it six hours: the Pawtuckaway range invisible, the boulder woods gone soft and shapeless, every driveway on the Deerfield road buried. 603 Plowing is out in the middle of it — plowing drives and lots, clearing walks, spreading sand and salt wherever the grade turns slick. Most of this work is finished before anyone sees it happen. That is the pleasure of it: a door opens at six and there is nothing but black pavement, banks squared off on either side, and a day that suddenly seems possible. Storms come hard off these hills, so the trucks go back around as many times as it takes.