We have just emerged from a snowstorm, rare for our region.  Below are some writings from recent days.  If I were a real blogger, I would have posted these each day that I wrote them.  A goal for 2009, perhaps?  

 

Thursday, December 18, 2008:  Fantasy Unveiled

 

As I write this, it is dark and cold outside.  Snow has covered our world and made it stop.  Snow makes everything stand still.  Even the shadows beside laden trees are unmoving, as limbs stay frozen in place.  A lone bird flies by the window and disappears.  The streets are silent.

 

This storm was forecast for several days.  I struggled the whole time, wanting the snow to hit my area but also not wanting it (as if my wishes influenced the outcome!). Snow brings me back to my childhood, and the forecast of snow takes me to a place of excitement that persists despite the burdens that snow and ice inevitably bring.  I grew up in Northern New Jersey, where snow fell regularly and drifts of several feet were common.  We did all the things children do in snow—sled, build snowmen, throw snowballs, eat snow. We stomped and tromped and claimed fresh stretches of snow with our footprints.

 

Of course the joy of a snow day is in not having to go to school, not having to fulfill the responsibilities that drive our lives. Given that I don’t commute now or go to daily work, of what use would a snowstorm be to me?  Why could I not stop wishing for snow?

 

In fact, all day Wednesday, when the storm was supposed to come but didn’t, I raced around town, feeling both happy to follow my plans for the day and cheated that we weren’t getting the snow that hit surrounding areas. When I awoke the next morning to the sound of thunder, I was sure rising temperatures had changed our snow to rain. But when I got up and peered out the window I discovered a street covered in white and snow falling steadily.  Thundersnow made it was official:  the storm was here and I was happy.  

 

I was happy despite knowing that our street would become impassable. I was happy despite knowing that I would not be able to get out to my office or a coffee shop or the gym and that cabin fever would strike.  I was happy despite knowing it would be smarter to wish away the storm.

 

 

Snow creates a pocket of time that does not exist otherwise.  It removes us from the routines of daily life.  It transforms the world into a place not just of beauty but of difference—a sight so unlike our normal view, we cannot help but stop and look and admire.   At a time of year when we expect a bleak world of bare-limbed trees and gray skies, we instead have a panorama of full decoration.   The world is suddenly art, a winter frieze.

 

Friday, December 19, 2008: Silence

 

I bundle up to go for my first walk in the snow.  I step outside into the breathtaking quiet and cold, a white vista stretching everywhere I look. As I enter my street, I see a neighbor, a young boy.  I watch him lie down in the snow, his sled nearby.  Lacking anything clever to say but wanting to connect with the only other person on the street, I ask, “Are you sleeping in the snow?”  He says, “No, I’m listening to the silence.”

 

I walk away, smiling, hoping the sounds of my crunching footsteps blend with his silent world.

 

Saturday, December 20, 2008: Brussels Sprouts and Yarzheit Candles

 

Today I decided I needed to get to the store.  Half a foot of snow is already on the ground, and more is forecast, and if we are not already housebound, we soon will be.  I decided to take a chance, thinking that “only snow” (rather than ice) on the roads would help me.  Hopeful and perhaps in denial, I drove the car out and promptly got stuck trying to leave our driveway.  My husband pushed me out, after which I swiveled around so that I was going in the opposite direction than intended.  At this point I couldn’t have gotten back into my driveway had I wanted to, so I set my sights on the goal, gunned up a hill, and made it out to the main road, where slow-moving cars formed a caravan towards the main shopping area, a hub of food, gas, and DVDs.  

 

The grocery store was exploding with energy, and carts moved chaotically in every direction.  Shelves were starting to show bare spots, and a produce worker said 84,000 people had come through the store the day before.  The mood was excited and frantic, as shoppers pondered what crucial items would carry them through the next wave of snow.  I waited at the end of a long row of vegetables where a tall man reached to the back row to get brussels sprouts.  He said, “I don’t know why they hide the brussels sprouts back here.”  “Not everybody’s favorite,” I said, knowing I would have to do the dreaded “stand on your toes” to reach them.