In 1976 I was 23. I had a friend who died of a drug overdose in Alberta - it was methadone (synthetic heroin). A year later, I was living in Montreal, trying to transcend the grief state i was stuck in...one day, I went Christmas shopping in a blizzard. I desperately wanted to get my father some real snowshoes for Christmas. I was to get on a train home to Toronto that night so I had to go out in the blizzard if i wanted to get the snowshoes - so I went. I was plodding through hip deep snow downtown Montreal. The street had not been ploughed and the snow was coming down in heavy blankets.