The snow started falling today a little before noon, Hanover time. Tiny flakes that might have been raindrops a couple of days ago drifted down, pirouetting about in the swirling winds, before finally coming to rest atop one another in soft powdery drifts; like confectioners sugar dusting a cake. I stood at the kitchen window at work this afternoon, transfixed by the specks of light that reflected off the snowflakes. Except that I was standing still, it seemed my world was a snow globe that some child had shaken, in order to watch the iridescent glitter fall to the bottom again.
I have ambivalent feelings toward snow. Some kinds I like very much, especially the soft powdery kind; dancing splinters of light. And the kind with clusters of flakes, diving to earth, colliding with each other on the way down to either break into smaller clumps or become enjoined, forming mega-clusters. That kind makes me wonder if that's how the planets formed, clumps of matter bumping and grinding and joining and breaking apart in their earliest stages of life.
Just like most other folks, I hate having to shovel snow, clearing it off my car, getting it in my shoes or down my neck; all the dirty piles of it at the curbs, overflowing the sidewalks; the tamped down snow that forms fall-on-your-butt zones. Then there is the slush on the streets that the town refuses to scrape away or salt, making a trip around the block a life-or-death/fender-bender adventure best left to tanks, or Humvees with ship-anchor chains on the tires.
I stopped for a few groceries on my way home which took a little longer than usual because of aforementioned slushy streets. By the time I pulled into the carport, dusk was well on its way to becoming nightfall. The security light at the back door shone across virgin snow cover on the lawn and the sidewalk leading to the house. The rainbow of light splinters caused by the light hitting the minute ice crystals in the snow took my breath away; it was so beautiful. Rather than mar the pristine surface of the sidewalk, I slogged across the blanketed lawn to the back door. Snow filled my shoes and clung to the bottom half of my pants legs, but I didn't care.
I wanted that perfectly flat strip of snow undisturbed so that later tonight, when all the neighbors' lights are out and the street lights at the front of my house have cycled off, I'll go back out with my high-powered LED flashlight and watch the light and fire and diamond-dust show the powder will put on for me. Sparkle, sparkle, sparkle.
It's a crow thing.
29 comments:
Oh, you make me miss snow, its beauty! You describe it all so beautifully that I feel like I'm there. I must be a crow too :-) What I dislike is when we get rain on top, what a mess.
Oh, I forgot about rain on snow...you're so right about that!
It still sparkles this morning, too. Guess it was cold enough through the night to keep the ice crystals from melting.
Thank you for stopping by, Marja-Leena.
We had weird Georgia weather yesterday. Here, 60 miles north of Atlanta, we had a "wintry mix," ice and rain, right at the 32 degree mark. Some roads were slick, and a truck carrying chickens overturned on one of them. Schools and local restaurants closed. Atlanta, at the same time, had 57 degrees.
Seems to me (and I blame global warming) our winters are warmer and more unpredictable than ever. Just eight or nine days ago, we had balmy 60F degree days and nights that didn't drop below 50F, which is not the norm for this latitude in winter.
I'm headed over to Daughter's apartment to pick up my 6'5" snow plow. That's how Grandson shovels the snow - sets the blade of the shovel agains the sidewalk and plows through the white stuff. He can do in 15 minutes what it would take me 45 or more to get done. We both win on this one - he earns pocket money and I don't end up so sore I can hardly move.
There was an English cartoonistsn humourist called Gerard Hofnung who told a story about looking out of his kitchen window and seeing a hedgehog in the square of light in the snow. He filled a saucer with milk and ventured out in his slippers and dressing gown to put the milk in front of the hedgehog. In the morning the snow had melted and he was greeted by the sight of his saucer of milk sitting on the ground in front of a lavatory brush.
Joe:
Oh, that's too funny! You've made my day with that.
This will get passed around over here.
BTW, your latest crow was beautiful - corvid perfection!
Nicely described, Crow. I like snow, but like it better when it's gone!
Thank you, Avus. I agree that it is better when it is gone.
If only it would snow in more convenient places!
Wow, that was so beautiful. It made me wish it was snowing here. I lived in Scotland for a while so got used to show there and my car being buried. There is not much snow here in Australia.
However, we have a tornado close by up north so we are copping very bad winds and rain at the moment. The weather has gone crazy all across the World it seems.
Thanks for visiting my blog. It is great to get new people stopping by and saying hello. I will read your blog too as I love good writing. Mine is a little silly really which probably sums me up well. Even though my daughter is grown up I still write those silly messages to her lol.
Hello, Lilly:
Well, it has reached the ugly stage now, and is no longer sparkly. Time for it to melt!
Sure hope that tornado doesn't touch down or cause much damage. Those things are hateful.
Thank you for visiting !
Palm trees, think palm trees. Beaches, drinks with little umbrellas in them.
You are right about global warming, I think. This year we have had only one brief snowfall, the kind you write of where the flakes coalesce and make big floating clumps. But it only lasted about and hour and was melted in as much time, ultimately turning into ice that 80 year olds are scared to walk on. And here it is almost February and I have a rose bush that keeps putting out buds.
After reading your post I felt nostalgic for the snows of my childhood in Andover, the glittering, powdery ones.
I loved the story about the saucer of milk and the toilet brush.
Mike:
You rotten booger, you! I shall think of warm places for the rest of the day and resent that I'm not in sunny California...wait...didn't you say it rained there?
Well, Mother Nature strikes again.
Anne:
Joe's comment tickled me so. I can see me doing something like that. Only I have possums in my yard instead of hedgehogs. No, I probably wouldn't put milk out for possums, on second thought.
This 65-year-old is afraid of icy walkways, too. I bought a pair of ice-cleats (don't know the proper name) lasr winter and they help. Still don't like ice, no matter what.
Oh I do the same thing - I make an effort to avoid walking on the parts of the snow I can see from my house to keep it as pristine as possible. Sometimes, it already breas the tracks of raccoons or birds, but that I don't mind.
This morning, early, I found bird wing patterns, probably the hawk in the backyard, with droplets of crimson in an arc on the snow. Leading up to the battleground were small rabbit tracks. No tracks after the bird landed.
Oh, what stories the snow tells, if you look closely.
Thank you for visiting, SAW.
Snow is best on mountain-tops at least fifty miles away. Any nearer and you run the risk of severe disillusionment. I reckon you shouldn't tangle with it since it appears you lack a stronger, more autocratic (let's say tyrannical) other to point out snow's whys and wherefores.
It was snowing when I arrived in Pittsburgh for the start of my great adventure. But I wanted to impress. I continued to wear my Savile Row suit and my elastic-sided ankle-height boots which made everyone laugh because they looked like bedroom slippers. My boss, a German with a dubious past and who was not used to being disobeyed, talked of galoshes. I smiled and ignored him. Two days later he said, "I see you ain't got yourself no galoshes" in a voice which he probably thought was pleasantly ironic but which to me carried military menace. I explained that in Britain only the unfashionable elderly wore galoshes. Two days later he saw me again, shook his head and said, "No galoshes. Sheesh." Thereafter he shut up. It was the only time in his life any employee had directly walked away from his advice. Thus I embarked on my campaign, which was to last the full six years of my US stay, of fostering a tendency towards foreign eccentricity. It's an RR kind of thing, Crow. Denied to you because I suppose they'd lock you up if you tried it.
I've just re-read your post. And come upon: "dancing splinters of light. And the kind with clusters of flakes, diving to earth, colliding with each other on the way down to either break into smaller clumps or become enjoined, forming mega-clusters." Good stuff. And then there's the specifically US bit: "slush on the streets that the town refuses to scrape away or salt." Always that adversarial attitude towards forms of authority, reaching its apogee when Americans talk (What am I saying? Complain!!) about the federal government. And I'm back scraping the snow off my car. knowing I'm an alien, paddling my odd canoe in the land of mixed metaphors. Knowing now, in old age, that galoshes (or the concept thereof) and huge intractable layers of US snow are part of my character.
Robbie:
I ain't afraid of no snow, bud. Just because I'm wonderstruck at its fleeting beauty in my backyard, doesn't mean I'm a wimp about it.
My eccentricity isn't foreign, at least not here. I'd have to live outside the US to have my oddness considered foreign.
As for my adversarial attitude toward authority, as long as they do the right thing (according to the Code of Crows), I have no problem. But in this case, as it was with ancestors in the 1700s, my ire is of the "taxation without representation" sort. We pay our taxes with the idea that we will receive - at least - basic services, such as street clearing when it snows. It takes years to have some potholes filled in, unless the holes are on the streets where town officials live.
I say "Bully for you!" for standing up to your overbearing boss about galoshes...or anything else he had no business being on on your back about.
Thank you for dropping by this morning.
Hi, Stopping over from Lilly's Life. I saw your gorgeous crow photo and wanted to see more.
I was raided on the east side of Cleveland so I. Know. Snow! And now I happily live in Southern California to avoid it. But it's posts like this that make me a bit homesick. I love your description of being in a snow globe!
Cheers, jj
JJ:
Thank you for stopping by. I'll drop by your blog in a bit.
I have a sister and a brother born in Ohio: sister in Cincinnati, brother in small town of Piketon.
After spending 18 rainy winters in Portland I find I'm still very wary of snow. There it only snowed once or twice a year at our 500 ft elevation but there were no ploughs and nobody owned shovels either. Once we were snowed in for a week while less than 10 minutes away by bus - the buses never came. Now we're in Halifax where the snow comes to mostly stay from December til March. Sometimes, early on, it's as beautiful to look at as you described. At this point I'm ready for the snowdrops and crocuses that will be blooming in Portland now.
It sounds as if your grandson is still young and strong enough to enjoy it all.
Susan:
The beauty I described didn't last long. The snow melted and ice formed on walkways. What little white stuff was left was washed away by the rain we had yesterday and last evening.
Today is wet, cold and creeps-into-everything damp.
The first harbinger of spring for me is the winter aconite that grows along the side of the yard under the sassafras and witch hazel trees by the side gate. When it blooms, the crocuses and snowdrops are close behind.
I hope they are for you, too.
You sparkle.
Your writing sparkles.
Thank you.
Hello, Fresca:
I tried to visit your new blog, but was unable to do so.
Say, I didn't know you're a watercolorist, on top of all the other amazing things you do. I like your paintings, the postcards.
I'll check back on the new blog.
Ok. I admit this is beautiful writing. But. I grew up in Iowa and have lived on the prairie for all of my life (except for one internship in Baltimore...)
I detest snow. DETEST it. I don't ever find it pretty. All I see is danger. Falling on my ass and breaking a hip. Slip sliding in my car. Freezing cold.
Maria, I agree with you about the dangers snd aggravations of snow, but I can't ignore the sparkle, the tiny shards of heavenly light when the snow lays it before me. I'd be a fool to do so, because not every snow has it.
I worry as I get older about slipping and breaking bones, and maybe someday those splinters of light will mock me as I fall to the ground, but until it does, I will keep on looking for it.
And as my butt strikes the cold, frozen ground, I will chuckle to myself, remembering your comment, and say, "Well, you can't say you weren't warned this would happen."
Give my regards to Bing, Liv and Socks. Thank you for dropping by. It's good to hear from you.
Love to you all,
Martha
And here some three weeks later, it happens again. Will we survive to see summer?
Lord, I hope so, Jim! How much did you get this time?
Hey, Crow!
Oh.. sorry, I'd commented here as "Frex"--that means I was signed in to a different account which leads to a defunct (actually never even born) blog.
At one point I was going to start a new one, all clean and fresh, you know, but decided I'd stick with the old one, warts and all.
After all, as the bumper sticker says, wherever you go, there you are.
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