Winter: It's not the end of the world

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas…

No wait, that's the wrong column…

It's beginning to look a lot like global warming…

No wait, that's the wrong theory…

It's beginning to look a lot like the winter of 1996-97 despite the optimism of a recent Inter Lake headline.

Oh yeah, that's it.

Fact of the matter is, we haven't had nearly as much snow as we did in late '96, but who cares? Short of a few blowing drifts, it is just as deep an accumulation as we had then, and just as hard to drive in.

Fortunately, we have avoided most of the collapsing roofs and cracking trees so far, but those could still be on the way, as more snow is expected in the next week.

There is one thing worth remembering, however, as we curse about shoveling snow and complain about horrid driving conditions: A snowy winter in Montana really isn't that bad. In fact, it's kind of wonderful.

So grab a camera and put on your boots. Make snow angels or make snowmen. Throw snowballs or build a snow fort. This is a good opportunity to take some photos for the family scrapbook. It's also a great opportunity for the kids to make some money shoveling snow, or just do a favor for an elderly neighbor by keeping the porch and steps clear.

If you don't want to venture outside, it's still the best time of year to have a hot cocoa and dream about summer. If you have a fireplace, by all means put on another log. If you have a deck of cards, deal yourself a game of solitaire, or if you have family at hand, now's the time to renew your love of pinochle, bridge, rummy, hearts or spades.

Oh yes, and it may also be time to reconsider the theory of global warming after all. It's impossible to use anecdotal evidence to confirm or deny something as huge as global warming, but it's also grossly irresponsible to extrapolate the end of civilization based on a few years of increase in temperature in the northern hemisphere, as some scientists (and Al Gore) have done.

No doubt about it, there was an increase in global temperatures between 1980 and 1998, but since then there has been a standstill in temperatures, with some recent declines virtually erasing the so-called precipitous increases at the end of the last century. It makes you wonder whether somebody just panicked, or decided to make a quick buck off panicking everybody else.

I mean, after all, it's also a fact that there was global cooling from 1940 to 1979, but we seem to have survived that "crisis' just fine. Maybe it's time to rethink the power of puny man, and to consider whether "man-made" global warming is the result of CO2 - or just an overactive imagination.

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Frank Miele is managing editor of the Daily Inter Lake and writes a weekly column. E-mail responses may be sent to edit@dailyinterlake.com