Tales From Exit 22 by Al Batt

Who knows what weather lurks in the hearts of groundhogs?

The Shadow knows.

I altered the words of that pulp hero, The Shadow, to meet my waggish needs. He had said, “Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows.”

It happens every year on Feb. 2. I take down the Christmas tree I’d neglected to dismantle a year ago and it’s also Groundhog Day, known As Who Cares Day in Arizona. Punxsutawney Phil sleeps soundly near Gobbler’s Knob northeast of Pittsburgh. His is a deep sleep. A hibernation in which his body temperature falls from 98 degrees to 37 degrees and his heart rate drops from 100 beats per minute to four. Phil doesn’t need an alarm clock. Each year, some irritating human wakes him early and demands a weather forecast, despite the fact that few groundhogs are certified meteorologists. Imagine yourself shaken from a dream just as the movie star of your dreams was hoping he or she was worthy of your affections. Your eyes open to see a groundhog has wakened you to ask if you’ve seen your shadow lately. As Roseanne Roseannadanna on “Saturday Night Live” would say, ”It just goes to show you, it’s always something — if it ain’t one thing, it’s another.”

If Phil casts a shadow, winter continues for another six weeks. He doesn’t need to see it. Just cast it.

Great crowds gather to see if Phil casts a shadow. One witness described the scene as “Huh?” It may sound silly, but it’s better than the average Super Bowl halftime show.

The idea of Groundhog Day comes from an ancient Christian celebration known as Candlemas Day, marking the midpoint between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. On Candlemas Day, the clergy blessed candles needed for winter and distributed them to people. Superstition held that if the day was sunny and clear, people could expect a long, harsh winter, but if the sky was cloudy, warm weather would arrive soon. The Germans expanded on this tradition, introducing a hedgehog to the mix. They believed that if the sun appeared and the hedgehog saw its shadow, there would be six more weeks of bad weather known as a Second Winter.

Many of Pennsylvania’s early settlers were German and they brought the tradition with them, trading a hedgehog for a groundhog native to Pennsylvania. Groundhogs are also called whistle-pigs, woodchucks and land-beavers, but not ground chuck. The name woodchuck might have derived from the Algonquin word wuchak.

There is a minor league baseball team called the Wisconsin Woodchucks and Chopper the Groundhog is the team mascot of another minor league team, the Gwinnett Braves. Chopper is no match for the Fighting Okra of Delta State University, but I digress.

I like groundhogs. I’ve never had to sit next to one on a long flight or serve on a committee with one. That might change my opinion.

In the movie, “Groundhog Day,” the weatherman Phil Connors (played by Bill Murray) said, ”When Chekhov saw the long winter, he saw a winter bleak and dark and bereft of hope. Yet we know that winter is just another step in the cycle of life. But standing here among the people of Punxsutawney and basking in the warmth of their hearths and hearts, I couldn’t imagine a better fate than a long and lustrous winter.”

Most Minnesotans wouldn’t need much imagination to think of a better fate.

In Minnesota, groundhogs typically hibernate from October to April. If some males are out in March, they probably exited a burrow on a south-facing slope.

How does Punxsutawney Phil do on his predictions? After all, he is the seer of seers, sage of sages, prognosticator of prognosticators and weather prophet extraordinaire. Records show he has forecast more winter 103 times and early spring 18 times. Phil believes in turning his face to the sun and letting the shadows fall behind him. He’s a wise woodchuck. How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? I don’t know, but Weather Underground says Phil has been correct 39 percent of the time, falling short of the accuracy of a coin toss.

Groundhogs are related to squirrels. If you don’t have a groundhog handy to consult with on your weather questions, ask a friendly neighborhood squirrel.

The word squirrel comes from the Greek skiouros, meaning, “shadow tail.”

So look for the shadow of a shadow tail. That will give you a seasonal clue.

But winter will still end when it feels like it.

Al Batt’s columns appear every Wednesday and Saturday.