Christmas Time: First Snow
In Frosty the Snowman, the first snow of Christmas is magical because it falls on Christmas Eve. While the idea of magical Christmas Eve snow is nice, I hate to think of a whole Christmas season without any snow to boost the Christmas spirit. I knew it was supposed to snow today, but I don’t know that I was really prepared for it to actually happen. Sure, we’ve had flurries through November, and my family got snow up at their place that even stuck for a little while, but we haven’t seen any real snow here yet this season. That just makes waking up to a dusting of white with fluffs of snow in the air all the more delightful.
Of course, it has just occurred to me that I’ll have to dig out the salt at the very least, and also the shovel so it’s accessible. If we get too much snow I’ll leave the shoveling to my husband, but if I can just kind of scrape it off, I should be fine. My mom is hopefully coming down today, if the weather clears up by this afternoon. Again, I wasn’t expecting it to actually snow like this. I wonder if it was this snowy when my husband left for work. Ah well, we have a full thing of salt from last year, so we are set, for now at least.
Aside from the responsibility of snow clearing, I am quite pleased with the first snow of the season. It’s made even more delightful by the fact that it’s come after Thanksgiving. I find that it’s always a little less special when it’s snowed already before December. One year it snowed on December 1st and that was the best. It was like waking up to a new season in Harvest Moon, where as soon as the season changes the whole world is automatically transformed. While not quite as fun as that, this snow is quite pleasing as we just got all our Christmas things out over the weekend so I’m in a super cozy, Christmasy living room.
I don’t know if I will ever be as excited about snow again as I was when I was younger. Learning to drive in the snow and deal with snowy sidewalks and brush off snow covered cars kind of takes the pure joy out of snow in general. At the very least it is tainted by the knowledge that the wonderful fluff falling from the sky is going to make at least one commute a pain in the next three months, if not many. But before the cynicism of adulthood sets in, I find that I can enjoy the beauty of the freshly fallen snow, at least for a little while. I have to enjoy it now, while I can. When it starts snowing in February I have a suspicious I’m going to panic a little inside as I think about driving to Magee in it. Thankfully, we have all main roads to drive on and they all tend to be pretty quickly cleared when the snow starts, but still, it’s a little nerve-wracking to think about.
Every year I think about making a snowman. It has yet to happen. It’s definitely not happening this year. Even if I could physically do the rolling and the stacking required for snowman making, I wouldn’t have the energy or the time, probably. We also didn’t manage to clear all the leaves out of our yard, so it would be a very leafy snowman. Snow angels are also out, as I’m sure I would never get back up at this point. We’ve reached the point where my husband has to give me a hand up out of basically every chair. It’s going to be a long two and a half months.
On the bright side, I’ll have years of snowman building in my future with two little boys. As I watch the snow fall, I can’t help but imagine what it’ll be like once they’re old enough to be excited about snow. They won’t have any cars to brush off to taint their snow joy, they’ll just be so excited for something new to play in. I’m really glad we have a yard for them to roll around in. We’ll have to find somewhere to go sledding, though. Our yard is kind of sloped, but not enough for sledding, I wouldn’t think. We’ll just have to go up to Papa and Grandma’s to use their hills. They have some good ones that don’t go onto the road. All of our hills are roads and that’s not okay. I guess they could kind of sled on the front hill, at our house, but it goes right onto the road and I don’t know if I want to introduce them to that. They will be Scavos, so I might be able to trust them not to sled there without supervision, but they also have Farkas blood in them and you just never know with a Farkas.
I am very excited to share the joy and wonder of a first snow fall with my boys, though. I can’t wait to see their faces light up when they wake up to see that the world has transformed over night. I can’t wait to bundle them up and send them out to play until their fingers are numb and they come in begging for hot chocolate and a movie. We will have to keep a ready supply of mini marshmallows through the winter. Hot chocolate just isn’t the same without mini marshmallows. Or whipped cream, either is acceptable. I have so many great memories of playing outside in the snow and I can’t wait to see what sorts of things our boys come up with to build and shape and what games they decide to play.
For now, though, they are safe and warm inside, snuggling with a very sleepy cat, which is where I’d rather be on a snowy day like today. The snow has stopped falling now, which is probably good. We have a nice coating of snow to make the world seem festive and the roads can be cleared and salted by this afternoon, so Mom shouldn’t have any trouble coming down. In the mean time, I can enjoy the snow out my window while I address Christmas cards this morning. I’ll get to that once I get up the nerve to disturb my sleeping kitty friend. I hope you are all enjoying the snow, if you have it. Have a lovely day, my friends!
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