Snow
I’m always surprised at how silently it comes and how quickly it goes.
The snow started Monday, but it was just playing with us. It melted as fast as it fell, accumulating just a little bit in the ditches and off the north side of the house. It turned to rain and dissolved itself, but sometime in the night became snow again.
I woke to a pure white blanket over the fields, up the hillside and sticking to the trees. The snow announces itself early by reflecting all tiny amounts of morning light into the house. I wake up groggy and confused and searching for justification to roll over and go back to sleep, and notice the light coming through the window is white, and not gray. That’s the paradox of a good snowstorm, I think. Snow, quintessentially winter, brightens and cleans the usually plodding gray days. So it’s like a toothpaste or a laundry detergent, only it can’t be newed or improved.
It doesn’t even feel overcast when it’s snowing. Like, the sky doesn’t feel like it’s covered with clouds. It feels like it’s full of … snow.
Wednesday I woke to clear, crisp blue skies over the white blanket. That’s when you wake to scads more light than you usually do – it feels like the sun is already up though you know it’s nowhere near to cresting that ridge to the east.
There’s nothing to do, of course, but go walking outside to make that snow crunch sound, then teach a two year old how to make snow angels (plus a pathetic attempt at snow horses.)
It melts off the roof first. By early afternoon there are wide gaps in the fields, and a little later all of it is gone. There are small reminders on the hillsides and under the trees, but it’s gone.
It rejuvenates the grass somehow. The fields, after the snow melts, under a blue sky, is a vibrant and electric green. Again the paradox. The morning gives you a snow covered field, a postcard of Winter, and fades into sparkling green grass, a postcard of Spring.
The snow started Monday, but it was just playing with us. It melted as fast as it fell, accumulating just a little bit in the ditches and off the north side of the house. It turned to rain and dissolved itself, but sometime in the night became snow again.
I woke to a pure white blanket over the fields, up the hillside and sticking to the trees. The snow announces itself early by reflecting all tiny amounts of morning light into the house. I wake up groggy and confused and searching for justification to roll over and go back to sleep, and notice the light coming through the window is white, and not gray. That’s the paradox of a good snowstorm, I think. Snow, quintessentially winter, brightens and cleans the usually plodding gray days. So it’s like a toothpaste or a laundry detergent, only it can’t be newed or improved.
It doesn’t even feel overcast when it’s snowing. Like, the sky doesn’t feel like it’s covered with clouds. It feels like it’s full of … snow.
Wednesday I woke to clear, crisp blue skies over the white blanket. That’s when you wake to scads more light than you usually do – it feels like the sun is already up though you know it’s nowhere near to cresting that ridge to the east.
There’s nothing to do, of course, but go walking outside to make that snow crunch sound, then teach a two year old how to make snow angels (plus a pathetic attempt at snow horses.)
It melts off the roof first. By early afternoon there are wide gaps in the fields, and a little later all of it is gone. There are small reminders on the hillsides and under the trees, but it’s gone.
It rejuvenates the grass somehow. The fields, after the snow melts, under a blue sky, is a vibrant and electric green. Again the paradox. The morning gives you a snow covered field, a postcard of Winter, and fades into sparkling green grass, a postcard of Spring.
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