Moving Snow Beyond Views

In the early spring at MAPLE in 2024, the community was going through something to do with shoveling and not shoveling snowy pathways.

I, Virabhadra, a Buildings and Grounds Agent, was right in the middle of this something.

I can summarize this ‘something’ as facing this question practically: Can the community find a way to maintain paths that does not lead to icy and more dangerous paths? Forall had pointed out that when we shovel snow from paths that are on a natural surface, such as grass, the path becomes icy and dangerous.

One day, in talking with Forall, I said we would not shovel the paths and that we would use a different method involving tamping down the snow.

The next day, in the early morning, someone in the community shoveled the paths again, a mistake. And hours later, a new tool and method were used to tamp the snow very differently than had been referred to earlier, another mistake.

Forall approached me on the porch, late in the morning, and noticed the shoveled path and the lack of tamping properly. He said that I lied, and I had lied.

I immediately went to find my supervisors to share these updates with them, finding only one, and then I immediately executed the tamping of the long path as best as I could, with help, given the time and tamping tool we had.

The next day a new tamping tool was made according to Forall’s design, and deep in my mind and body I held the view that it would not work, as it involved dragging four cinder blocks, too heavy a load for two people to pull on the path uphill. I helped make this tool yet I thought, in its intended and full use, it will not work.

Later, I watched briefly as others tried to use it, struggling clearly. I did not see them make much of any progress before I went back to my chore.

At the end of my chore, the two people who used the tamping tool returned, having successfully completed their objective. The path was cleared and set in a new and better way. I was surprised, as what I deeply thought could not be done was done, and I basked in unknowing for a minute or so.