Six inches fell in back, eight up front. Not that numbers tell you anything. The snow was wet in back, not too difficult to shovel, but crusted out front, which made it heavier.

I’m not the one who usually shovels, Lori has done it for years but is unable to this year, being laid up after her accident, so this winter has seen me shoveling—and it’s been quite a winter, especially the month of February. I shovel every two or three days because of our frequent storms. Today, a pause in rain-sleet-ice of some 45 minutes was predicted, so I hurried down, grabbed the red shovel, and started working. An hour later I stopped; the sleet had resumed.

There are few things to compare with entering a warm home after all this, taking off (with some difficulty) the snow-encrusted boots, jacket, gloves and scarf, putting your feet into warm slippers and heating up some oats.

“I’ve always loved to shovel snow,” Lori told me. “It gives me a sense of accomplishment.”

Indeed, how often do we look back at an hour’s work and see the difference: a path furrowing its way across big snow mounds, steps cleared, lanes cleared towards birdfeeders. Many of my efforts don’t show dramatic results so quickly. There was a bit of a hurry this time because big winds begin to blow tonight (I’ve already brought up the hurricane lamps in case we lose power, a high-probability event), accompanied by a deep freeze tomorrow, so everything will ice over. Later today I will refill the birdfeeders that are now being emptied by the birds with great urgency. I’m sure they have a sense for what’s coming and they’re storing up as many seeds as they can.

At the same time, I look at the expanse of snow that covers up the trunk of the oak that was taken down a decade ago, the front yard and driveway, and I can’t help but love this vast white ocean, a reminder of what’s simultaneously singular and universal. And then, after a cup of coffee, I start shoveling paths, creating new avenues that bisect and curve, towards some destination. A little like life.

Aussie naps on the sofa, I wear my snow day sweatshirt. Nowhere to go, and still, lots to do. I pause, reminding myself that this is no longer the eve of destruction but rather we’re well into it, and only then open up the newspapers. Sure enough, alarms are everywhere—not just here but in many countries. Stuck at home, I use the quiet to firm up my resolve and to remind myself of my values and vows.

What are they?

Relieve suffering as far as I can. On a day like today, the reach is not so long; Musk’s digital arms seem to circle the globe. It doesn’t matter. Speak honestly from the heart, write from the heart, remember and remind others that we have faced bad times before, that we have seen dictators take up perfectly legitimate grievances and transform them into tools of hate, fear, and intimidation. They smirk their way through the political landscape, but the only waves they create, the only ones we have to fear, are the waves of cynicism and, even more dangerous, apathy.

“We have not overcome our condition, and yet we know it better … Our task as [humans] is to find the few principles that will calm the infinite anguish of free souls. We must mend what has been torn apart, make justice imaginable again in a world so obviously unjust, give happiness a meaning once more to peoples poisoned by the misery of the century. Naturally, it is a superhuman task. But superhuman is the term for tasks [we] take a long time to accomplish, that’s all.”

Albert Camus wrote this as a Jew living in Nazi-occupied France during World War II, fighting in the Resistance.

So yes, in the face of rage, disappointment and frustration, I continue to:

Work towards peace.

Step out of echo chambers and create bridges among different people, identifying the many things we have in common because we’re all human beings.

Help keep immigrant families safe and warm this winter.

Plant seeds for cooperation and mutual respect even in soil covered up by unrelentingly hard ice. Spring will come, the ground will soften.

Remember, as Gandi said, that people are people; it’s their actions that can cause harm, but people are people. Evil finds no place here, not even in my imagination.

We tend to think that what happens now will go on forever, but even as I write these words, I’m getting WhatsApp messages from cousins sharing old photos of our parents, aunts and uncles, the previous generation. I see them as they escaped Czechoslovakia, either before the Holocaust or after. There’s one of my mother wearing a long skirt, white, button-down shirt, and bulky shoes, posing smiling to the camera What an era they lived in! What challenges they met! Who am I to lose heart and clamp down?

I don’t fool myself, all I do is find and take my place inside a life force that has no beginning and no end. I find inspiration in people, like Camus, who don’t give up. What gives life? I always ask myself. There’s always an arrow, a pointer, and that’s the direction in which I go.