Saturday, January 29, 2011 12:00 am
Anyone who works outside in winter has a right to complain long and loud about Mother Nature's malicious sense of humor.
But even those of us who hunker down indoors have cause to grumble this year as weather forecasts have proven once again that it takes true grit to outlast a Montana winter.
A few days of chinook winds broke the long chain of days with snow cover, keeping this winter out of the record books. But snow never left the ice ruts by the curbs or the shoveled piles heaped beside driveways.
Those spells of sidewalk skating and braving arctic wind chills have left many of us longing for spring. This winter's treacherous trio — snow, ice and cold — has kept some older adults and disabled adults cooped up indoors, shut in for days at a stretch.
But, like most Montanans, they've had years of experience putting up with whatever Mother Nature dishes out.
Joan Evanson, an energetic 80 year old, doesn't let ice and snow interrupt her exercise routine. Each morning, at 5:30 a.m., she does laps through the hallways of her apartment complex on the West End.
“I walk the whole building for an hour each day, from one end to the other and up three flights of stairs,” said Evanson, who lives at the South Forty senior housing complex.
She started exercising religiously after treatment for breast cancer 18 years ago.
Ten full laps, including stairs, equals three miles.
Each spring, she competes in the Montana Women's Run, a race she has won and placed in several times in her age category.
Evanson would prefer to walk outdoors, but “What worries me is the sidewalks. I don't want to fall,” she said.
A plaque on her apartment door reads, “Old Age is not for Sissies.”
Being cooped up this winter has left 72-year-old Joseph Bouchard itching to get out on the motorcycle that he bought last summer.
Bouchard, a retired missionary who also lives at the South Forty apartments, bought his Honda
Rebel 250 when he thought he would head back to Europe, where he lived for several years.
This summer he plans to head out on the bike to visit relatives in New York. Although he has been involved in the Jump for Jesus motorcycle stunt group, he does not do stunts.
Three days a week, he drives the South Forty's shuttle van, ferrying seniors to the grocery store and on other outings. A friend has loaned him a car for the winter, but the vehicle has sat for two to three weeks at a stretch.
“I'm not acclimated so much to this bitter cold,” Bouchard said.
He is qualified to referee basketball games, but he hesitates to commit to volunteering in bad weather.
While the apartment complex offers plenty of activities, he has noticed that he's slowed down a bit.
“In one sense, the winter does keep me in,” he said. “I don't get out much to see the people I know in the ministry. I don't go out much at all in the winter. I'm kind of locked in.”
Most of Marvin Berg's social life revolves around the Magic City Terrace apartments, an 84-unit complex for older adults in the Heights.
As chairman of the residents' association, Berg and his wife, T. Marie, stay busy organizing potlucks and two to three other activities a month. He attends a nondenominational morning Bible study at the complex and plays the Hammond organ in the community room.
“I've got bad lungs. I'm very susceptible to pneumonia. I really hesitate going out when it's cold or windy,” he said.
He uses oxygen at night and carries portable oxygen during the day.
Berg, who is 83, was raised on a ranch in the foothills of the Castle Mountains, 14 miles west of Martinsdale. In his youth, he and a hired man fed the livestock using a team and a sled.
“That was the daily routine, so we didn't think too much about it,” he said.
Now, he and his wife often spend three or four days at a stretch without leaving the apartment building. This winter, they've gone a week to 10 days without driving their car. Nearby relatives typically provide rides.
The parking lots at the grocery stores are treacherous, Berg said.
Though they generally take their own car to doctors' appointments, plenty of other seniors in the complex rely on shuttles or special public transportation.
“We definitely aren't what you might say 'landlocked' or anything,” he said.
Many of the clients at COR Enterprises, which provides training, employment and independent-living services to adults with disabilities, rely on the city bus system.
“It's been a little bit treacherous and cold even walking to the bus stop,” said Jodi King, the director of supported living for COR.
When the weather's dips well below freezing, staff often pick up clients and take them to work in the company's minivans. On a snowy day, it's difficult to rely on taxis to get to their clients to work on time, King said.
For some of the 80 clients in supported living, snow and ice hamper their social life.
“I think we're all feeling cabin fever,” King said. “We've seen some behavior and some depression too. You can just really see where they're sick of not being able to get out.”
Wintry weather hasn't put much of a damper on the turnout for the senior citizens lunches at the Avenue D meal site, said Site Coordinator Mary Beth Brotzel.
“They're hardy, and they're Montanans,” Brotzel said.
A 90-year-old and a 92-year-old have been regulars this winter, and Brotzel knows one woman in a wheelchair who never misses a day.
But many seniors are cautious about falling on ice.
“There's the potential to slip just lifting up a foot to get into a car,” Brotzel said.
Since balance may deteriorate with age, ice can be particularly worrisome.
“We're out busting our buns so we're making sure our sidewalks are clean,” she said. “Other places around town are not as vigilant.”
While some seniors will miss a few days at the meal site because of the weather, they rarely stay away longer than four days, Brotzel said.
“They get lonely and isolated,” she said.
Socializing is often as important to them as the food.
“I call winter a time of rest and healing. It makes the world slow down a little bit,” she said.
The “real troopers” this winter are the volunteer drivers for Meals on Wheels, said Joan Kimball, human-resources director for the Yellowstone County Council on Aging. Volunteers in the RIDES Program also use their cars to take seniors shopping or drive them to hair appointments.
At Mission Ridge, more people ask for transportation to the grocery store or to their normal appointments because they don't want to drive their own cars, said Margie Prokop, the event coordinator for Mission Ridge and St. Johns Foundation.
“We're running more runs than we ever had before,” Prokop said. “They really just don't want to get out in the cold and the bad roads.”
She has also noticed more people eating in the dining room at lunchtime and increased participation in activities. Since January tends to get a little dull after the holidays, the independent-living complex has organized a formal evening meal for the end of the month, perhaps with piano jazz for entertainment.
Ethel Fleming, 95, takes the Mission Ridge shuttle to go shopping or get to appointments. For the last two years, she has gotten around in a motorized electric scooter.
“They take me, my scooter and all on the bus,” she said.
In good weather, she zips on her electric scooter from Mission Ridge over to St. Johns to get her hair done.
She has felt occasional twinges of cabin fever since she gave up driving.
“I miss jumping in my car and going where I want to go,” she said.
When she drove, she used to pick up a couple of friends and go to church in Ballantine. Now she goes to morning devotions at Mission Ridge after gathering for coffee with friends.
In mid-January, she was longing for summer, when she can head out for long “walks” on the electric scooter.
She and her husband moved into Mission Ridge in 1998. For the first 10 years, the winters were mild, she said.
“The past three winters, it's getting more like the good old days that were really cold.”
Joann Feist and her husband, Joe, made a dramatic lifestyle change in June, when they moved to Mission Ridge from a ranch at Huntley Project.
“Last year, I was shoveling walks and going to the chiropractor,” Joann Feist said. “It's a complete change from where we had to do everything for ourselves.”
She's gone from driving 120 miles a month down to driving 10 or 20 miles. Her husband, who has a heart condition, uses the Mission Ridge shuttle for trips to the doctor and other appointments.
With so many activities at Mission Ridge, there's not enough time to do everything in a day, she said. They both exercise regularly, and he helps out in the wood shop.
The worst of this winter's storms hasn't kept her totally shut in.
“We have a little dog that we have to walk every day,” she said. “So, I'm usually out a little bit every day.”
Contact Donna Healy at dhealy@billingsgazette.com or 657-1292.
