Winter Memories Part 1
Now that I live "out in the country" again, I'm reminded of how it was, living in unincorporated South Holland. So many things remind me of those years when I felt I lived in a rural area -- just 5 or 10 miles from the Chicago city limits. I guess I've always felt like a farm girl.
I remember one year, I must have been about 7 or 8 years old. We had an extremely cold winter and the Little Calumet River (which at the time was fairly clean) had frozen over. Now, our street made a long, deep U-Turn from Route 83 (14700) to about 15600 south, ending at a bend in the Little Cal River, then curved around for nearly 4 blocks and then (as Markham Drive) returned to Route 83. My dad had a small tractor that he had built that he used to maintain our property. One weekend day, he walked down to the Little Cal, checked the thickness of the ice, then came back home and fired up the tractor. I followed him down the road to the river -- where he drove the tractor down on to the ice, lowered the snow shovel he had mounted on the front and proceeded to clear a large "rink sized" section of snow. We then went home, bundled up, grabbed the ice skates and thermos of hot chocolate and returned to the river. It didn't take long for word to spread and the entire neighborhood turned out with hot chocolate, coffee and I think, donuts for everyone. We had a wonderful neighborhood skating party on that thick river ice.
This is one of my most cherished childhood memories of winter.
I remember one year, I must have been about 7 or 8 years old. We had an extremely cold winter and the Little Calumet River (which at the time was fairly clean) had frozen over. Now, our street made a long, deep U-Turn from Route 83 (14700) to about 15600 south, ending at a bend in the Little Cal River, then curved around for nearly 4 blocks and then (as Markham Drive) returned to Route 83. My dad had a small tractor that he had built that he used to maintain our property. One weekend day, he walked down to the Little Cal, checked the thickness of the ice, then came back home and fired up the tractor. I followed him down the road to the river -- where he drove the tractor down on to the ice, lowered the snow shovel he had mounted on the front and proceeded to clear a large "rink sized" section of snow. We then went home, bundled up, grabbed the ice skates and thermos of hot chocolate and returned to the river. It didn't take long for word to spread and the entire neighborhood turned out with hot chocolate, coffee and I think, donuts for everyone. We had a wonderful neighborhood skating party on that thick river ice.
This is one of my most cherished childhood memories of winter.
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