HALLIE EPHRON: Here in New England, autumn is ending and the frost, as they say, is on the pumpkin. When I go out in the morning, the grass is frosted white. And we finally had our first flakes -- big fat ones, more sleet that snow.
But still...
It's always special when the first flakes fall – and year after year I’m transported back to my first snow.
Growing up in Southern California, I never experienced snow. Plenty of smog and Santa Ana winds, but no snow. My first snow fell in the middle of a biology final I was taking in the gymnasium at Barnard College in New York City. I wanted to drop my blue book and race outside and revel in it.
Years later I taught a 6th grade New York City public school class filled kids who were recently off the boat from Cuba or Dominican Republic. Come the first snow, we all rushed to the classroom windows and watched.
Then we bundled up and marched outside to the playground where we all spun around, mouths open, catching snowflakes on our tongues. And learning the English vocabulary of snow.
Do you remember your first snow, or was it something you took for granted?
LUCY BURDETTE: Growing up in New Jersey and Michigan, there was always snow! We miss it entirely now, spending the winter in Key West. I think I miss seeing it, though I hated the ice!
I loved watching the dogs in snow too, though poor Lottie has never seen it.
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: That is a great question! Well, hmm. I was a little girl in Chicago, and I have no memory of snow in Chicago. BUT I do have a photo of me, somewhere, of me about about age 4? In a dark green wool coat and green “snow pants”--green wool, where the ankles zipped up and down to allow for boots. And I think I am wearing a snow hat with flaps. So there must have been snow, right?
Wait. Interesting thing. I think the photo is in black and white. But I definitely remember that outfit was dark green. I have never thought about that before this very moment. And when I moved to Indiana.
Snow only meant we didn’t get to go to school. And we tried to get our Irish Setters to pull us on sleds and they totally refused.
RHYS BOWEN: Growing up in rural England we usually one snowfall a year that actually stayed on the ground without melting. I remember waking up on a snowy day and there was something about the light, a sort of eerie yellow glow, that made me realize something was different.
But the year my brother was born, 1947, we had one of those unusually cold winters in which the snow stuck around for a while, and I borrowed a tea-tray to try sledding down our driveway.
Then again in 1963 we had an arctic winter with snow on the ground for months. I was at college and we had to negotiate the paths through the grounds. Roads had awful ridges on them and sidewalks were piled high.Some girls who had skis found places to ski around London.
I never appreciated snow till I went to Austria and Germany for the first time and saw those sparkling mountains. So magical!
DEBORAH CROMBIE: I have some vague memory of it having snowed when I was eight, of walking my baby cousin bundled in his stroller through the snowy streets. Whether that comes from old photos or family stories or something that I actually did, I don’t know.
I know that when I was a bit older, we used sheet pans and trash can lids to sled down the steep banks between our lawn and the creek that surrounded our property. In summer those banks were covered with blackberry brambles and poison ivy, but we seem to have been unscathed!
We usually get at least one snow in the winter, sometimes just a dusting, sometimes enough to bring the whole city to a halt, but it seldom lasts more than a day or two.
JENN McKINLAY: I grew up in the mountains (Appalachian) in northwestern Connecticut. Boy, howdy, did we get snow!
From October through to March (sometimes April), it was snow, snow, snow and as a kid, I loved it. Snowball fights, ice skating, sledding, we loved all the outdoor fun. My mom used to heat maple syrup and pour it on the snow, where it would freeze into “snow candy”.
Truthfully, I don’t remember my first snow because from the time I was a baby, half of the year was always snow.
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I was (metaphorically) born into snow, at the Plattsburgh AFB Hospital, and despite spending my earliest years in Alabama, I can't remember a time when winter didn't mean snow. Going out to play with bread bags over my socks and under my boots, thick double-sided mittens my grandmother knit for me, coming home from Midnight Mass with fat snowflakes falling all around, and best of all - hearing Mom listening to the radio early in the morning, and then coming in to my bedroom and telling me, "It's a snow day!"
I still get excited when it snows, even though I know I'll be in for some shoveling!
HALLIE: SNOW CANDY! I remember reading about that in a children's book and being so sad that we couldn't make any in Beverly Hills. Though our local Saks Fifth Avenue actually imported snow one year. Beverly Hills... what can I tell you?
So... what about you? Was there any magic when you first experienced snow?
Like every other New Jersey child, we loved snow . . . snowballs, snowmen, sledding, no school . . . every child's fervent winter dream. Sadly, I can't say that I remember our first snow since there was always winter snow as far back as I can remember . . . .
ReplyDeleteThat's how my grandchildren in Brooklyn think of it... YAY a day off from school. Their parents: OH NO a day off from school.
DeleteThat’s exactly one example I use in my classes to illustrate point of view!
DeleteAnd they can all relate - great example.
DeleteI grew up in southwestern CT when it was colder than it is now. Winters were always snowy, we had favorite sledding places, and we skated on the ponds. I don't remember my first snow but I do remember having to wait with my siblings at the back door of the kitchen while Mom struggled to get us all into snowsuits, boots, and mittens. Now I live in the northern Adirondacks, where it can snow from October through May. The long subzero meat-locker black and white landscape took me a while to get used to, but in recent years it rarely has snowed so reliably and I find I miss it. We have about six inches now (much more in the peaks) and my husband and daughter, fervent cross country skiers, are praying we don't lose it in Wednesday's rainy thaw before it gets cold again Thursday. (Selden)
ReplyDeleteWe never seem to have quite the right amount of snow for cross country skiing here in the Boston area, because I'd love to do it.
DeleteConnecticut girl here. It snowed all winter and it would stick. We would grab our sleds and trudge over to my grandmother's house where a steep, grassy hill continued down onto her long, sloped driveway and eventually down to the street. We'd meet our two younger cousins there, pile onto our sleds and off we'd go. We'd build snowmen and forts. When you are little, even a 4" snowfall comes over your ankles. I have photos somewhere of the four of us sledding. Woolen hats. Woolen mittens. Woolen sweaters. Snowpants. Good memories.
ReplyDeleteLovely memories!
DeleteDo you remember the smell of those woolen clothes drying in the cloak room off the classroom in school? What a distinctive stink!
DeleteMargo, it smelled like the sheep were in the cloak room, not just the wool.
DeleteGrowing up in New England, I loved snow. I even loved digging out after a storm, then going to the local diner for an early morning cup of coffee while the rest of the world were layabed slugs. As a teenager, I would drive to the city and watch all the people who didn't know how to drive get stuck in the snow after a storm -- I was kind of a supercilious snot back them and probably still am. Living in Florida now, and with more brittle bones, I appreciate snow only as piece of nostalgia. If it started to snow here, I''d not be singing "Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow;" rather I'd be singing, "Please melt soon, please melt soon, please melt soon."
ReplyDeleteAnd I'd be joining you on that chorus.
DeleteAnother southern Californian here. Hallie, do you remember that people would "go to the snow" - drive up into the mountains to play or ski or whatever they did (our family didn't) and then pack their car with snow to show off when they came back?
ReplyDeleteI was living in Bloomington, Indiana at age twenty-five and walking to see a movie with a friend when it began to snow real flakes, my first ones. I had a green wool thrift store coat and I stared at those tiny perfect flakes just like the big ones we cut out of paper when we were kids. I said to Carmen, "They're so small!" and told her I thought the flakes would be the size of the paper ones (7" x 7", maybe). She said, "If they were that big, they'd knock you out."
I have loved the New England snow since I moved here in 1982, and became an avid cross-country skier. I even like the fresh air and exercise of shoveling it. But we don't get anywhere near as much lately.
Though I'm happily doing without the ocasional blizzard...
DeleteEdith, I'm laughing at the idea of snowflakes the size of the paper ones. What a great thought! (Selden)
DeleteUntil this recent move to Florida, I lived in Nebraska, Missouri, Iowa, and Minnesota. There was always snow, but there is something magical about that first snow of the season. It was fun playing in it as a kid…two pairs of mittens and the bread bags over your feet inside the rubber boots…snowmen, snow angels and sledding. Hot chocolate when you go inside and grilled cheese with tomato soup for lunch.
ReplyDeleteI do remember a blizzard in Nebraska where you couldn’t even see the house across the street. The power went out so our neighbor and my dad carried my little sister and me and my two older siblings hung onto their belts ( probably Mom held on too) in order to make it to that house across the street that had a fireplace for warmth. When the storm was over the snow was so high and so packed that you could walk across all the yards even though they had chain link fences.
OMG - What a memory!! Only once have we had a snow like that. Over my head. Fortunately we didn't lose power.
DeleteWe spent one winter in Newburyport, Massachusetts, and the snow drifts were so high, a Boston television station measured them in "Shelbys," after veteran reporter Shelby Scott who, late in her career, was assigned to cover every horrible winter storm imaginable.
DeleteJerry, what year was that? I live in Amesbury, next town over. In I think it was 2013, we had so much snow there was no place to shovel it TO. We had a flume leading from our side steps to the driveway.
DeleteIt was back in the mid-90s, Edith, in the days when every snowflake on Earth found its way to Newburyport.
DeleteDon’t remember my “first” snow, as I was born in Connecticut in mid-November. As others have said, snow was just what happened in the winter. No school days, waiting for the plows to come. Don’t miss the snow at all on this Florida beach that is no home. Elisabeth
ReplyDeleteI get it... and yet here I am still in New England all (or most of) winter.
DeleteOops, wrote my first post before coffee. Should beach “now” home! Elisabeth
DeleteBorn & raised in Toronto, there was always snow for months.
ReplyDeleteBut I looked forward to the smowstorms that provided good packing snow to make snowballs. And making snow angels in fluffy snow was fun.
In Ottawa, the first snowstorm came late this year on December 4. We got another 10 cm/4 in on Saturday/ Sunday & a third storm is starting this afternoon. But that storm will also give us freezing rain which I hate.
Ice storms are the worst. SO dangerous, just setting foot outside your house. But OMG SO BEAUTIFUL when the sun comes out before the ice melts. Like a scene from FROZEN.
DeleteBeing born and raised in Hawaii *(during WWII) I dreamed of snow as a little girl! As youngsters, learning of huge snowfalls in the East, we wondered if it would "Flood" when
Deletethe snow melted! Forty years ago when my husband and I moved to the Columbia
River Gorge in Washington state, and purchased our River House, we endured a week
long "Ice Storm" sans power and unable to move our car from our garage to our front
gate (40 ft or more). We waited over a week until Triple A was able to come and tow us
out to the road! I'll never forget the sound of the trees falling, *(from the weight of
the ice), it sounded as tho we were living in a war zone! *And I agree, it was beautiful
to look at, but horrible to deal with for days on end! Once the ice melted,
the damage it left behind was horrendous! Mother Nature is NOT to be messed with nor underestimated!
Lynne..San Diego (too much sun, not enough snow! ) We are never happy, verdad? ;)
Lynne, fellow relocated-to-San-Diego resident here. I would say “too much sun, not enough rain! And today we get a Santa Ana to dry out whatever isn’t already bone dry. Si, es verdad! — Pat S
DeleteLOTS of Santa Ana days so far this winter!
DeleteIce storms are the worst, Grace. We had those quite a bit the years I lived in Kansas City, Missouri. Unlike the other places I’ve lived the snow there usually melter and was gone before we might ever get more. The other places it felt like we shoveled the same snow over and over again that just drifted back in and it would hang around until Spring. The ugly black from car exhaust snow along the streets that would thaw and refreeze into concrete- like blocks was also nasty. No more shoveling for us now!
DeleteHallie, do you remember teaching a workshop for us here in Pittsburgh in the middle of a blizzard? I still have that picture of you, me, and Martha Reed showing off our snow boots.
ReplyDeleteI have no first memory of snow since I grew up with it. But I do remember my best friend and I sledding down a long hill on my grandparents' farm. Our goal was always to make a tight turn near the bottom and sled through a narrow gate in the picket fence to continue down through the farmyard to the road. We never succeeded, always wiping out on that tight turn... which in hindsight is a good thing. We'd likely have gotten hit by a truck had we actually made it all the way to the road. Side note: I told this story in front of my mom when she was in her 90s, and she was appalled. She'd never known what we were trying to do!
Annette! I do remember the workshop (was it for Sisters in Crime and Mystery Lovers?) but I do not remember the boots. And if you'd been my kid I'd have been apopleptic.
DeleteYes! Our Pittsburgh Sisters in Crime chapter hosted, and Mystery Lovers probably handled book sales. And, yeah, it truly is amazing that I survived childhood.
DeleteStill chuckling at Edith's astonishment at the size of a snowflake! I mean, how would you know, right?
ReplyDeleteHere in southwest Ohio we have had the law of diminishing returns apply to snowfall. We used to get heavy snow at least once a year that would hang around for a week or two because of the cold, something that rarely happens now. We have used our snowblower once in the last five winters. Growing up it was too flat in our town for sledding, except on the other side of town, and my family did not partake. I don't even remember building snowmen, although we must have. I'm such a wimp for cold weather.
Most of my snow memories are with Steve and our kids, who all loved sledding and playing in the snow. Steve would bundle the girls into the car and drive to a good hill when they were older, but we also had a great sledding hill in front of our old house that all the kids in the neighborhood liked to use, safe for even the littlest children. A favorite day was when school was called and my middle daughter and her other fifth grade friends were out playing in deep snow, literally wallowing in it like puppies. While I watched from the warmth of the kitchen with a cup of hot chocolate in my hands.
That's how I like to "ski" - with hot cocoa and watching through the window.
DeleteExactly, Karen. One winter night when I was a child, freezing temperatures were forecast, and we put a pie pan of water out on the patio to see if it would freeze (it didn't). My mom had to dig up tulip bulbs and store them in the fridge for the winter because the ground didn't get cold enough. Life in SoCal!
DeleteHallie, you and I would have a great time back at the lodge together!
DeleteEdith, I remember one extremely cold Christmas when I was in third grade. We were at my aunt's house before midnight Mass, and my uncle decided to throw the proverbial glass of water out to see if it froze before it hit the ground. It actually did!
DeleteThen in February of 1978 we had a blizzard, followed by nearly two months of severe cold, as low as -36. At the time I lived in an apartment at an intersection with uphill streets in three directions. The water mains froze and burst, then the water froze into a thick sheet of ice at the dip, twice. Snowplows came along and plowed up the ice sheet, which trapped all the cars parked on that part of the street for weeks. My older neighbor who rode the same bus with me downtown could not get her car out for the entire time; the ice was clogged all around her car, up to the windows. The guy who lived down the hall had a four-wheel drive car, and he good-naturedly took us all to the grocery store for a few weeks.
You definitely find out who the "good neighbors" are in the aftermath of a blizzard. I am so fortunate being surrounded by generous kind souls. And my next door neighbor and I share the driveway. Between us it gets shoveled.
DeleteKaren, that '78 blizzard was my first winter in Indiana! What an introduction...
DeleteThe blizzard of ‘78 was a doozy! I think we got a little extra lake effect snow up in NW Indiana, too!
DeleteEdith, you must have wondered what the heck you got yourself into!
DeleteI don't remember my first snow, but I do know that ice is what I loathe. Pure clean white fluffy snow can be fun; ice not so much. We had a long day of snow falling yesterday, so today is all about shoveling...
ReplyDeleteAnd snow that's collected on top of ice - lethal. I once slipped and fell in a parking lot of snow-covered ice... and then I literally could not get up because it was so slippery.
DeleteI would have to have a very fantastic memory to remember my first snow. my mother said it was snowing the day I was born! Even in early April, as that was, snow was common for the entire month and not unheard of as late as Mother's Day in May. The first snowfall each year almost seems magical, with a lovely covering on all the November brown. But now I am more than over all the deep snow we got on Thanksgiving. Until yesterday the temperature has been low enough that the snow seems to be staying. And we also get a lot of lake effect snow, which might amount to a couple more inches every night. Don't ask me what lake I am being affected by since I haven't figured that one out. I live about half way between Cooperstown and Albany, but my elevation is high enough that we always get more snow here.
ReplyDeleteMy husband went to Cornell. On a rainfall map it's a black hole, and I'm guessing you weren't all that far away, Judi. His apartment was on a slippery hill and he used to slide down it to get home and hang onto a tree to stop himself.
DeleteMy brother went there, too! Maybe all that has made us stronger!
DeleteI was about 9 years old, the first time I experienced snow. We were at our family's cabin in Idyllwild CA (mountains east of LA) in Dec. I remember waking up and seeing snow flakes and the ground completely covered in a blanket of white.
ReplyDeleteThe grandchild (7) was here last weekend, and has been agitating for snow for a while. On the morning that they were leaving, there was a small smear of whitestuff on the front deck. She quickly went out (coat wide open) and rolled up a 2” snowman – two balls on top of each other. She told Alf the dog not to pee on it!
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile on the other side of the house, Prue, the new white deaf kitten is rolling snowballs by skidding into the snow causing it to ball up and pitching them off the deck.
It doesn’t take much to entertain us!
As for snow when we were kids? We would climb up the snowbank to the roof, and then slide down – always better if you had a piece of cardboard, but slippery snowpants would work. Of course, we never told our parents… Don’t see that volume (often) any more.
Kudoes to our grandgirl and kitten - stars for enertainment value.
DeleteI don’t remember my “first” snow. It might have snowed when we lived in Japan but I was only 1 1/2 when my parents were transferred back to the States so no memory. I first really remember playing in it in Harlan, Ky when I was in kindergarten. Enough that my Mom helped my brother and I build a huge (to us) snow woman with a hat and apron. And we could tunnel through the snow. There was always snow when we lived in Massillon, Ohio for forts and sledding. And the big blizzard of ‘78 when I was in my first apartment. So much fun when you’re young!
ReplyDeleteSo much fun when you're young and don't have to drive anywhere!
DeleteIsn’t that the truth, Hallie!
DeleteI can’t remember my first snow as I’ve been born at the end of January in Quebec where it snowed almost half of the year.
ReplyDeleteI had a photo of me about four years old all bundled up with my father both shoveling the yard. I probably was more a nuisance than an help but I loved doing things with him.
Danielle
Awww, what a sweet memory.
DeleteI grew up in Central New Jersey where snow was a constant all winter long. We built snow forts and lived on a street with a sledding hill. When I was older, I took my dad's Flexible Flyer sled over to the iced sled run at the local grade school for sled races. When we lived in Atlanta, I remember waking the kids at 530 for sledding in our front yard before school. The snow melted by ten, so it was the best, once-every-three-years treat.
ReplyDeleteI can imagine just how special it was
DeleteI grew up in "upstate" NY, meaning above Albany! We had snow forts, snow tunnels, ski jumps and snowball fights galore! We had a huge hill in our backyard, followed by a straight-away, followed by a short hill, a shorter straight-away and then the Hudson River. Tobogganing down solo, you could make it to the river, or you could crash into trees! Always exciting! I LOVE snow.
ReplyDeleteAnd no one ever ended up IN the river?
DeleteI loved snow as a child--no school, playing in the snow, snowball fights and snow people. In Western Oregon, we don't get a lot of snow but we generally have some, and there were a few fairly heavy snow events when I was a kid. I do love that first day of fresh snow, going out in the early morning and walking around.
ReplyDeleteAs an adult 9-1-1 dispatcher, I had to get to work no matter what. I hate driving in snow and ice. Mostly, I had a friend take me. A couple of times, we were able to get area police officers to pick us up. Once, when we had thick ice on top of snow, I had to slide on my butt to get off my porch to get out to Pete Gallucci's patrol car. Of course, he asked me to play a joke on one of his fellow officers in exchange for the ride. Working during these events was never fun--people falling on the ice and breaking limbs, car wrecks, people stranded, fires due to downed lines. We often stopped responding to non-emergency calls. Oh man, I'm going down memory lane.
During our last ice storm in January, 2 women died in a church fire in my neighborhood. They were pastors who had been staying in the basement apartment of the church--so sad. The church was torn down a few months ago, but I think of them when I walk by.
what an interesting and poignant perspective you havek Gillian. We (I?) tend not to think of dispatchers as "real" people - and that's more than an oversight.
DeleteLike Gillian, living in Seattle we didn't see much snow. Instead frequently almost daily nasty cold rain. When it did snow, my mom would make waffles for dinner. Growing up without much snow experience, she would become very anxious if my dad was returning from work. He, on the other hand grew up with hard winters and didn't think much about it. Remember putting on tire chains? I remember that hassle. The mountains were close enough for the skiers, and the hills in town when it did snow, where exhilarating for sledding.
ReplyDeleteIn 1978 it snowed in Tampa. Once a century is enough for me.
Ha ha ha - yup that's about my timeframe, too. Sadly I live in New England where snow is a given. Though last winter our flakes were few and far between.
DeleteI grew up in Ohio -- southeastern Ohio the first 10 years, central Ohio thereafter -- and snow was pretty much always a part of winter life. I have not "first snow" memories. For me, two key snippets of snow memory are that the one and only winter I lived in Milwaukee -- maybe 1982? -- it snowed constantly and the radio kept referring to it as "the snowiest winter in Milwaukee in 40 years" or some such line. Fortunately, or sort of, I was commuting by city bus that year so I barely had to drive in it. And the city of Milwaukee did a GREAT job of clearing the roads, thus the bus never had a problem. The piles of snow by the side of the road towered far above my head, though.
ReplyDeleteSecond, the year my son was born, 1993, it snowed significantly the night he was born. Light snow was falling as we went to the hospital on November 4 and the ground was blanketed by the time I came out of the delivery room on November 5. That is unusually early for a sticking snow in Ohio.
Snow wreaks havoc in places where it doesn't usually snow. Here the main roads get cleared ... it's the side streets (and therefore getting TO the main roads) that can become skating rinks.
DeleteWe've gotten some snow here in southern Maine and it's the best kind - not so deep I have to shovel a "poop chute" for the Shih tzus or get the driveway plowed, enough to make things look pretty and wintery.
ReplyDeleteAh the joys of having a dog. Cats just like to sit in the window and watch the flakes fall.
DeleteI also grew up in Ohio, close to Lake Erie. We are about midway along the southern curve of the lake, so many times these days we luck out and the 'lake-effect' snow pummels Cleveland and places farther east and misses us. I also don't have a first-snow memory, having been born in early January. One of my favorite snow memories is when I was in elementary school. Our house was originally at the intersection of two roads. When the Ohio Turnpike was built, the road in front of our house became a dead end and a bridge was built over the turnpike for the other road. The school bus wouldn't come down the hill to our house, so we had to trudge up the hill in all weathers to catch the bus. I can recall getting off the bus one snowy afternoon, the snow drifted all across our front yard, and coming in to find my mom at the stove with a huge pot of hot chocolate waiting for us. It warmed us all the way down to our toes--and those toes could get awfully cold on the creaky old bus we rode!
ReplyDeleteSOCKS! Flora, your comments remind me of how hard it is to find descent winter socks. Ones that keep your toes warm and don't slip down inside the boot when you walk.
DeleteI really don’t remember the first time I saw snow. I’ve lived in CT my entire life, in the southern part of the state on Long Island South. It’s here every winter. We don’t get as much snow as the interior and northernmost parts of the state. Some years we get way more snow than I can handle, and other years there’s only one significant amount of snowfall. Physically, I’m not really supposed to shovel snow. Every year I dread having to go out and shovel it. Even though I live in a condo, I’m expected to shovel my car out from under the snow, and shovel my deck and the stairs leading down to the parking lot.I would love to have a second home in a warmer part of the country, maybe Hawaii! (I can dream!)
ReplyDeleteDebRo
I forgot to mention that we had lots of fun sledding down a hill behind us, and making snowmen, and eating snow!
DeleteAn early memory of my dad pulling me along behind him on a children’s sled just popped into my head!
DebRo
Wouldn't Hawaii be great!! Guaranteed no-snow. But Connecticut is pretty great, 10 months out of the year.
DeleteDebRo, I also grew up along Long Island Sound. I miss it. The water, the ledges, the eel grass, the cattails, the pebbly beaches... but I miss the 1960s there, probably would not recognize a lot of the CT of today. I hope it's still beautiful for you.
DeleteI also dream of Hawaii!
DeleteGolly, born and raised in NJ with multiple winter holiday trips to my great grandparents farm in upstate NY. I don't remember a time without snow. Now I live in far northern Maine and we're on our third snowstorm of the winter with rain expected mid-week. Go figure!
ReplyDeleteKait, stay safe! You all get the snow AND the auroras!
DeleteOne morning I woke up to see snow outside my window and it snowed all day! I was amazed to see snow in the East Bay (SF Bay Area), The next day the snow was all gone! Twenty years later it snowed again. I remember going out to dinner with family in the East Bay and it was so cold that the snow was still on the lawns the day after it snowed!
ReplyDeleteThat's so weird... I lived in Los Angeles until I was 20 and it never came close to snowing.
DeleteI remember when it snowed twice in Houston when I was in elementary school. So exciting! One of those times, Mom, a Texas country girl, made snow ice cream with snow, vanilla, and sugar. Since then I've lived places where snow is the norm for winter. That first snow is always so beautiful.
ReplyDeleteLove your description. Yes, it is pretty magical, even when you're used to seeing it. Like a sunset or an autumn tree.
DeleteThe first snow is magical but by March not so much.
DeleteGrowing up in Compton, in south-central Los Angeles, I remember having only one snowfall. I was quite young, but I recall watching from the window, and then rushing outside to roll around on the front lawn. One snowfall. Perhaps 75 years ago. Magical.
ReplyDeleteHow did I miss that?!?
DeleteGrowing up in WNY (I was born in Erie, PA, but we moved before I was 2 and there would have been snow in Erie, too), snow was a part of winter. It was always there. Somehow, we rarely had snow days for school.
ReplyDeleteI do remember I preferred to be indoors with a book than outside in the cold, though. Even as a small child.
They were probably so used to snow that they didn't need to close the schools.
DeletePretty much. And they stored the buses in heated garages, so they didn't have cold weather issues starting the diesel engines.
DeleteLike Diana, I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. It snowed once when I was little and we got to skip church. We built a sad approximation of a snowman. I saw some flakes fall when I was in high school and even in San Diego it’s “snowed” a couple of times in my many years here.
ReplyDeleteBack in 2018 I got the brilliant (?) idea that we should go to Chicago the day after Christmas. (I was inspired by a children’s book, The Sixty-Eight Rooms by Marianne Malone, set in the Thorne Rooms in the Chicago Art Institute.) My son and I are native Californians and had never really experienced city snow. We had a great time and the snow looked beautiful from our 15th floor hotel room. Trying to walk on the icy sidewalks cured me of any desire to experience it again! — Pat S
And you probably did not have snow boots - essential to preserve life and limb when snow walking.
DeleteSo much snow in my NW Indiana childhood! Can’t remember my first snow, but the Blizzard of ‘78 that so many have mentioned was my first blizzard. To be followed by the even worse Blizzard of ‘79 that caused a mayoral change in Chicago over the issue of snow removal.
ReplyDeleteAh yes, politicians are tested by blizzards.
DeleteWe are much more likely to get ice than snow, and in a city that is not well prepared for any sort of slickness on the roads, that is not at all fun. One year we had an inch thick sheet of ice on our driveway, and although after a couple of days the roads had cleared, our driveway did not melt and we couldn't get our cars out of garage!
ReplyDeleteThat's amazing. Ice is the worst. Beautiful. But so dangerous.
DeleteLiving in Western NY for 25 years meant an average 12 feet over our five month winter. Now? Not so much. I grew up just north of Kansas City, and snow was a winter constant just as tornadoes were a summer delight. I have no memory of my first snow.
ReplyDeleteAnd I had that same outfit, Hank, only mine was blue, zippered snow pants and all. Those were necessary for little girls who wore dresses!