Tomorrow, the weather gurus are
predicting that the snow will fly crazy mad where I live. The winds will blow
with hopped-up force, too, they say. Conditions will get nasty, the
temperatures will dip, and there will be an excitement in the air that’s been
missing in my neck of the woods for too long.
The snow gods have not been good to us
here as of late, and we’ve noticed. I’ve noticed. Winters in Nebraska should be
snow-filled. They should be white. They should be icy and treacherous. They
should be bitter and biting. Winters in Nebraska should be as harsh as the summers
in Nebraska are. Winters in Nebraska without snow aren’t really winters in
Nebraska. They’re like a circus without clowns, incomplete. That’s the kind of winters
we’ve seemingly had too much of in Nebraska lately.
Don’t get me wrong. I hate the winter. I
hate everything about it, other than the snow. The snow I love. I always have.
I hate being cold. I hate scrapping frost off of windshields. I hate wearing
sweaters. I hate having to wear a stocking cap inside to keep my bald head
warm. I hate long johns and gloves. I hate ice. I hate snowplows. I hate it
all. But if I’m going to live in Nebraska, give me snow. I love the snow.
I love the isolation that only a long,
contemplative walk in snowy woods can offer.
I love the goofy energy that my dogs get
when the snow is drifting down. I love watching them burn that energy off by romping
through the white stuff, bearing those noses as deep as they can, and tearing
through one drift to get to the next.
I love the romanticism that is a snow floating
from the skies on a winter night.
I love the grace of a lilting snow
falling on my face with the backdrop of the black sky up above.
I love the magic luminance that the street
lights conjure up.
I love the way the sun dances like a
child on the newly created banks in the morning.
I love the snow.
That’s why I’m looking forward to
tomorrow, when inches and inches of the fluff are expected to congregate. My memories
that involve snow are good ones and they’re numerous. Like the ones of sledding
as a kid south of Ashland, past the grocery store, past the Giles’ house, and
into the canyon where at the bottom of the hill you had better duck your head or
risk having your dome taken off by the barbed-wire fence waiting menacingly
down there for children to approach.
Memories like coming home from college
with my friends, only for a blizzard to force us to hole up inside—with no
alcohol, with no girls in proximity, and with no way to escape.
Memories like sledding on the hill near
Wiggenhorn Park with the scores of other kids who had the same idea. Run after
run we’d make, all in complete and utter safety thanks to the good-minded town
leaders who blocked off the hill from traffic.
Memories like the hill directly beside
my own house, where for the last 10 years all of my children at some point have
zoomed down, fallen down, rolled down, and tumbled down, laughing and smiling
and basking in what it means to be a kid.
Memories like riding in Rick Hammers Volkswagen
bug, bumping from snow bank to snow bank like a pinball and loving every minute
of it.
Memories like the monster eight-foot sledding
ramp my cousin Daryl built by hand next door, going so far as to get the garden
hose out and water the thing to create a nice thick sheet of ice overnight.
Memories like walking with my dad as a
kid while he checked his traps, wondering if this was how the early mountain
men did it, too.
Memories like scooping off the back
patio in the dead of winter so my sister and I could shoot baskets and keep our
skills honed.
Maybe winters in Nebraska aren’t so bad,
after all.
I really do love the snow.
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