Valentine's Day Snowstorm

The thing about snow is that so often it comes quietly in the night. They may say that it's coming on the news, but I never quite believe it; then I open my eyes the next morning, and the world outside my window is a white, frigid, silent wasteland. Often if I sleep a little late the first clue I have that it has snowed at all is the sound of the snowplow clearing the street in front of my house. (I live just across the street from the town's elementary school, so my street is typically one of the first to be plowed...unless, of course, the snow has caused school to be canceled all together). Snow is great...on the first day. Until you have to go out in it. Until you have to shovel it. Until it starts to melt, and turns to slush and mud.

I grew up in a land of perpetual rain. I love the sound of raindrops against my roof and windows; they're such a tangible, audible reminder that even though Baby it's cold outside, I'm safe and dry indoors. The perils of rain are familiar ones (at least for me): sure, sometimes the roads are slick, sometimes you get water places you don't want it, sometimes (and yes, this has actually happened to me), a tree whose roots have grown loose in the rainsoaked soil blows over and falls on a corner of your house. A rainstorm can be LOUD, especially when accompanied by thunder and lightening; and when the wind gets roaring in behind it, it can literally shriek in intensity. Snowstorms such pussycats in comparison. Snowflakes just keep on piling up and piling up, until finally they stop accumulating and you walk out into it to see for yourself just how much there really is.

I suppose if I had grown up differently, I might feel just the opposite. I might fear earthquakes instead hurricanes, and better appreciate the freshness and purity of the newly-fallen snow. It's not that I'm insensitive to charms of winter in New England -- those Currier and Ives, snowdome landscapes which trick you into thinking that you are living in simpler times, when people really did travel over the river and through the woods in a one-horse open sleigh. And at the end of the day, when you have a fire going on the hearth and a mug of hot tea, a good book to read or the right person to snuggle with, I guess it really doesn't matter what the weather is. And I suppose that when the power goes out and you are left alone in the cold and the dark... well, that's pretty much the same deal too. So here's hoping that today finds you warm and dry and and snug and cozy, instead of cold and wet and shivering in the dark. No matter what the weather is where you live....