Snow

I awoke to snow a few days ago. An inch, maybe two at the most, but it transformed Hillegersburg. One of the first things I always notice when it has snowed is the quiet. Our neighborhood is usually quiet anyway, but when there is a cover of snow it's different kind. Having spend my whole life in the northeast United States, snow is nothing new to me. I grew up praying for snow days, gambling from time to time by not doing my homework. For some reason, though, the first snow here was exciting and different. It was unexpected, and it was just sticky enough to really cover everything. I woke Bob up, despite the early hour and the darkness, so he could see our first Dutch snow as well. I'm not sure he was as excited as I was, but he didn't need to be up for a few more hours so I do understand his lack of enthusiasm.

I dressed for work in the silent darkness and enjoyed a hot cup of coffee and some breakfast looking out my big picture window onto the snowy wonderland below. The traffic was slow, drivers tentative. A few brave souls biked slowly down the road. I bundled up and stepped outside to walk to school. Though it was still dark at 7:45 (the sun doesn't rise until about 9 am right now) there were kids playing outside. Their joyful shouts in the neighborhood made me smile as they had snowball fights and built snowman in the pre-dawn light.

I expected the snow to be gone in a few hours. Everyone here said it snows from time to time but melts rather quickly.

Three days later. There is still snow on the ground and an occasional flurry in the air. And it's cold. Much colder than I expected. We're going home to Maine on Monday for a few weeks, so this is really just a dress rehearsal for the frigid temperatures and possible feet of snow we will likely face in the coming weeks. My first Dutch snow, though, was magic.