Of Easy Wind and Downy Flake

The past five or six years of my life i have lived much further south and east than i do now. Generally in or near a swamp. Even in the "winter" it rarely got below 45, and it was not unusual for it to be above 70. We would generally get about 1 inch of snow, and the entire area would shut down. Out-of-towners would mock the natives, claiming these Southerners to be cowards and to be biding their time in terror, waiting for the last vestiges of our tiny store of snow to disappear. They certainly disliked driving in it, but i know very few Northerners who relish driving on snow. In any case, i do not believe that fear was the only thing that kept them home. Say that you had a choice. A choice between driving in slush to drop your kids off in school where they will spend the entire day inside, and then continuing on to your little cubicle and spending your entire day inside under the fluorescent lights, and then driving in more slush and worse traffic to retrieve your progeny, thinking wistfully of summer and the thick, hot air, the feeling of sand in your underwear, the smell of the swamp, your red, peeling skin and the itch left by those tiny, lyme disease carrying vampires... A choice between this, and Snow. One snowflake was interesting, but not enough to get your hopes up. Two, well that's twice one, and we're making progress. Three? People start looking out the windows and forgetting their work. Once you get up to four or five, people are whispering excitedly to each other about the time eight years ago when the area received above four inches. As the snow increases, so does the frivolity. As soon as you get 20 - 30 flakes, people are pressing their faces against the window, and the most optimistic are outside trying to catch one on their tongue. Soon everyone (age four to 94) is outside, with plastic bags in their shoes, running and shouting. Snud (Snow + Mud) balls are flying everywhere, and tiny, one foot high snowmen are made... In the more rural areas, people tie sleds to the back of trucks and are driven around at about five mph - the height of excitement. Snow means an unexpected release, a journey back to simpler times... Of course, it also means a lot of muddy prints in the foyer, but the floor needed to be mopped anyways. So i very eagerly looked forward to the first snowfall i would experience up North, where everyone was an expert. It was in late October (very early, i am told). I woke up at 5:00AM to finish some work before i left for class. The ground was not there anymore. Instead were clouds, and soft, white clumps of cotton were falling from the sky. Who could resist? I dragged on my new boots (which i had bought with much anticipation - they were on sale, a beautiful glossy brown lined with fur) and wrapped myself up in my cloak (yes - it's a Gandalf cloak, but that's another story entirely). Everything was so still, so silent. There was nobody awake in the whole world but me. The whole earth was glowing and yet shrouded. I sang. ~*~*~*~*~ Dust Of Snow: The way a crow Shook down on me The dust of snow From a hemlock tree Has given my heart A change of mood And saved some part Of a day I had rued. by Robert Frost