I woke up early this morning -before the sun was up. I peeked out the window, and what did I see?
Snow. Lots and lots of snow. It isn’t unheard of in Arizona, but it isn’t exactly commonplace either. There’s something downright poetic about freshly fallen snow. The muddy aftermath is something different entirely, but we’re not here to talk about that.
Or how my carpets will suffer.
We’re here to talk about a blanket of snow. How is it that something SO cold can make you feel SO warm? It has the potential to take lives, yet it somehow makes us all feel safe. As I stepped into the snow this morning, the air around me was silent. No roosters -no dogs… just silence.
The snow was still gently falling, and I just took it all in. The smell -the feel… it’s really something, isn’t it? Early mornings and daybreak speak for themselves, but when you add in a few inches of snow, it’s breathtaking.
When the sun more-or-less came up, I took a few pictures.
It made me recite Robert Frost’s poem “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening.”
Just hearing the words in my mind filled me with warmth -the poem’s meaning, like the muddy aftermath, is something utterly different. Again, we’ll just focus on what’s in front of us. It’s hard to feel the cold meaning behind words when they’re lumped together so comfortably.
“The woods are lovely, dark and deep…”
Ahhh, Bobby Frost. You lyrical genius.
I took pictures of cat tracks in the snow. A flock of black birds made a sudden, mass exodus from one of my trees and scared the growing filly next to my house. 
I love that action shot. I looks more like a real, live medieval photograph taken during an attack… raining arrows!
My daughter woke up uncharacteristically early (in fact, she didn’t wake up until 10 am yesterday and that was only because I WOKE her up. She wasn’t happy and quickly informed me that in her dreams she had been flying on Santa’s sleigh with her Grammy. She stretched out her arms and wistfully said, “I wish I was still dreaming…”), so I told her to look out of her window.
Wonder of wonders!
Brother, GET UP!
He didn’t want anything to do with it, but I hoisted him up and forced him to look. He crumpled back into my arms.
“I want to go back to sleep,” he muttered.
“Do you want to snuggle up with Daddy in my bed?” I asked.
“No,” he groggily replied, “I just need my boots.”
These are the days I’m glad I picked up snow gloves for a $1 on the spring clearance rack. AND I actually remembered where they were in the house! Wonder of wonders, indeedy.
I tried to get my husband outside to build a snowman with the kids, but he gave me his gloves instead, insisting he had to be at work, or something. Nonsense, if ya ask me.
Our snowman was amazing, can I just say? Until he crumpled. We all headed inside. I was too tired to care. The girl was too cold to care.
But the boy? Man, oh man. Those TEARS can work a mother over.
“DADDY!” He wailed, tears streaming down his face, “My snowman just MELTED!”
What kind of mother would I be if I let defeat be the order of the day? In any case, when he’s 5 and 9 and 11 and 27, I’ll remind him of that snowman and how WE CONQUERED.
Put our shoulders to the wheel, so to speak.
In a matter of minutes, we had our snowman… built more carefully this time.
The ground is entirely covered in snow, and we couldn’t find any rocks to use as eyes, lips, and buttons… so we improvised and busted out mom’s tiny scented pine cones.
My daughter had gone inside long before, citing the cold as the most vile of offenders.
We joined her after taking pictures. Our power was out, and the boy soon drifted back to sleep (he really did just want sleep), so after doing some cleaning, Lacy and I faced off for three grueling rounds of Candyland.
My husband called about that time and told me he was going to try and come home early from work. I cheered and started listing everything we could do together!
Movies!
Hot cocoa!
Freshly baked cookies!
Blankets!
Cozy, cozy, cozy!
“We really just need to get some cleaning done,” he said, breaking my winter spirit. He wasn’t ENTIRELY wrong (though maybe just a little) since the house actually isn’t in bad shape so long as you stay away from the computer desk and out of the bathrooms.
I rolled up my sleeves and cleaned the computer desk off, hoping it would up my chances for those freshly baked cookies and Christmas movie.
While I was bustling around the house, I saw this:
She was sitting on the table, facing the window, munching on a pile of dried pineapple bits, and just WATCHING the snow. By this time, the power had come on. She had infinite entertaining options, and there she sat, the smartest of us all.
“Want to sit by me?” She asked, scooting over on the table top. I did sit by her (in a chair), we ate pineapple bits and watched the snow fall.
It was sublime.
So maybe we should clean.
Maybe we should watch movies.
Or maybe… just maybe… we should sit at the foot of life and enjoy what it gives us in the moment it gives it to us.
And maybe we should also take pictures of our children when they insist on wearing their Elmo Easter basket on their head when they can’t find a hat to wear outside.
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