Shovelling snow rekindled memories

Sometimes you forget things that you do with your children but are reminded later in life.
It happened to me this past Sunday. With my two sons at home, they both were out helping me shovel the snow from the driveway and walkways around the house.
As the mounds of snow were reaching above chest height on either side of the driveway, I asked if they remembered sliding off the piles of snow into the driveway on their red plastic toboggans.
Adam remembered getting his toboggan for his birthday. He also reminded me that he and his friends had used the big piles of snow on either side of the driveway to build snow forts.
The forts flooded back into my mind. Coming home from school with his friend, Andrew, the two boys would stay outside and worked hard to build the snow fort. They even tried to burrow down into the snow so it would have a roof, but not with any success.
Living on Second Street East, the town always did a good job of removing the snowbanks, so we never had to worry about the boys making forts on the side of the street.
Adam was probably only three or four, but he remembered sliding across the driveway. But with a smile on his face and a mischievous sound in his voice, Adam admitted the moment that really stood out in his mind was jumping off the roof into a pile of snow.
I had forgotten about that—that moment in history was long forgotten in my memory. My older son, Brendan, hearing this, remembered the day, too.
The three of us (Adam, Brendan, and myself) probably had never divulged to their mother what we had done, but both Brendan and Adam remembered. I had to ask them what roof they jumped from because I had no memory of it.
Now putting young boys up a ladder onto a flat roof really isn’t a good idea, but I have to admit that I did it. They were probably aged 10 and eight at the time. I suspect I probably worried more about them falling off the roof than really helping to clear the snow, but they were up there helping me.
Once the driveway and walkways were cleared, my oldest wondered if we should clear the snow from the family room roof. It was a good question and the two boys soon found themselves in three feet of snow on the roof.
I stayed on the ground holding the ladder.
With a scoop and push shovel, the two spent almost 45 minutes getting the snow from the roof. A pile that was above my shoulders had been created and my oldest, Brendan, reliving his childhood, jumped from the roof—burying himself to his waist.
It brought smiles and laughter to all three of us.