The first snow of the season is on this list.
For five glorious minutes or so every year, I see the magic. I'm able to push aside the damp, heavy blanket of experience. To forget that it means months of freezing cold. Slush. Frozen hands scraping the car. Day after day when we can't go out because the van lacks four-wheel drive. Our permanently chilly house. That feeling each morning that I have to force myself, physically force myself, to crawl out and hit the icy floor and pull on clothes so that I don't stay in my long underwear with a hat pulled down over my ears all winter. The effort it takes not to spend day after dark weary day alone in the house grousing and sniping at each other. Play dates must be carefully arranged, no more skipping to the park and running idly into friends.
The brief northern summer has spoiled us, played with our emotions, kissed us on the cheek and departed. There's nothing now until May but longing.
I detest winter. I am always cold. My blood grows sluggish in protest. My skin turns to unpleasant scales. My nose runs. When the big, wet crystal flakes started to fall this afternoon, I focused on the squeals of joy. I let them loose to wonder and stomp and catch it on their tongues. I even grabbed my camera and braved the wind, let them laugh at the white dust in my hair.
During quiet time, while Cue napped, I reverted to my Grinch-ish nature and glared out the window in disgust as it started to stick. He woke at 3:30. The light had already changed, short day fading into black night. He's too big, but I carried him down the stairs anyway. It's the only time of day that he is cuddly and pliant in my arms. He gasped on the landing, twisted to see over my shoulder out of the big double window. I felt the bitter draft pouring through the single pane. He saw the magic of the uninterrupted new snow.
"No, momma," he pointed, "no outside." I stopped to look with him, to hold him while he marveled, his runny red nosed pressed to the freezing glass. "No on da trees. No on da car. No on mine ball! Momma! No on mine ball!!"
"Yes, I see it, baby, I see the snow."
"No on mine ball!!"
"Uh huh. Snow on your ball. It's everywhere, isn't it?"
"No eveywhere." His excitement made him hard to hold. He lurched to the side. He wanted down to run to the door, to find his sister and brother, to share the wonder. I pointed out mundane things transformed for long minutes more, holding him close, wanting to see the magic through his eyes a little longer.
I'm closing my comments for most of the month of November while I participate in National Novel Writing Month and National Blog Posting Month. I can't ask you to talk to me every freaking day for thirty days. That's cruel and usual punishment. My email is always open - anymommyoutthere@gmail.com.E&E Tally: 7404 words (This is so hard.)
Blog posts: 13/30 (My library books are overdue.)
crop.jpg)
