When I no longer thrill to the first snow of the season, I'll know that I am growing old.
---Lady Bird Johnson
First Snow; Wendy Edson
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Real Hallowe'en---NOT trick or treat night: that was held on Sunday (the 28th) this year. We didn't get a single urchin, sweet or sassy, at the door, and the jumbo bag of chocolate treats sits on top of the cupboard, taunting and tempting---this year, REAL Hallowe'en falls on a Tuesday.
We sit at the dining room table with Mark's brother Tom and Susan, Tom's wife, and we eat steak that was broiled inside.
"It's too COLD to grill outdoors," Mark decided, and so we broiled instead, and now we eat beef and salad and fries, put out the tray of cookie bars to munch on, and we sit at the table and share stories and memories. There is laughter on this very dark, very cold night.
Tom and Sue depart before it gets too late; their RV is parked at Wolfie's campground, and their little dog, Tucker, a patient and loveable little beast, waits there for them, in the warmth of their rig's reliable furnace. They arrived on Sunday, and the weather has been contrary. Slogging rain. The air grows colder and colder.
We do indoor things for the first part of their visit: eat a big red sauce meal at home, visit the new Downtown Exchange's food court, take a tour of their amazing rig (such smart storage! How can I replicate that cleverness in my home??), play with Tucker.
And the rain gets more desperate; the air grows colder. But Wednesday, the weather app promises sun. When I get up, early that day, I am pleased to see the sky is star-studded, navy blue velvet.
But I am shocked to see the carport roof is evenly dusted with a confectioner's sugar coating, and the black cover on the grill is limned with white.
While I soaked in a steaming tub last night; while I read the last pages of an intriguing memoir, my head propped up on pillows, and only my hands poking out from the warmth of the tufted tan comforter (are there, I wonder, soft knit reading gloves to wear to bed???); while I snored, my book, finished and firmly closed on the little bedside stand; sometime, during all of that, the sky opened and let loose the first snow.
The first snow. And then everything changes.
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We are not strangers to snow that sidles in toward the end of October,--that sidles in, slyly, and says, "Oh! Whoops! Am I early????"
Many a Hallowe'en we spent layering snow coats sadly on top of our too-cool-to-cover up costumes, and then many more years doing the same for our children, puffy, flushed figures in quilted snowsuits and plastic masks that grew very cold quickly against tender soft cheeks. Then—out to knock on doors, to carol, "Trick of Treat!" at kind people who had no idea what the costume under the coat might be, but who chose to be treat-ers, anyway.
But those days were spent in western New York State, in places like Mayville, which gets considerably more snow, often, than even Buffalo. I expect early snow THERE, but not here; not in tropical southern central Ohio.
Weather.com tells me ("When Does the First Snow Generally Come?") that Buffalo, New York's average first snowfall is on November 5. In Columbus, Ohio, the first snow doesn't fall, on average, until November 20.
I send a whiny "Why is there snow??!!??" text to my friend Wendy in Hamburg, New York, complaining about the white dust on that carport roof. She sends back a beautiful scene she sketched after hiking in the Boston, New York, County Forest on Hallowe'en day. The snow is soft and deep; it's indented by the prints of booted feet.
I stop complaining.
I start thinking instead about all the things that first snows mean.
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Fine artists like Wendy are called to draw or paint that first pristine snowfall. Poets celebrate it, year after year.
There is a movie called First Snow (imdb.com, 2006) that stars Guy Pearce as Jimmy, a "…smooth-talking salesman certain he is on the verge of a big break." And then—his car stalls in an unfamiliar place, and a local prophet tells Jimmy that a very good thing is about to happen. But Jimmy is filled with dread, not excitement. As the snow falls, and he is tethered to a strange place for the duration, he grows paranoid, certain that the snowfall will bring change—but not the kind he hopes for.
There's a band, too, called First Snow (firstsnowband.com). They're a tribute band, a "Rock Holiday Orchestra." Their concerts are, for instance, homages to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, and they travel around, bringing holiday music to appreciative audiences.
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And that's one of the things about the first snow: it turns my face toward Christmas. So this week, I get online and start ordering some gifts I've been plotting. I discovered what I think may be the perfect gift for someone whose name I cannot mention here; I order it, and the package arrives within a day.
But it's not what I ordered. I go online and fill out the return form. What did we send you in error? it asks, and I fill that in, and it sends me a QR code. I take the erroneous gift and the code on to Staples, and they pack up the mistaken item for me and send it off. That very night a replacement package arrives. I put my slippers on in the fine wee hours, pull my bathrobe tight around me, and step out onto the cold bricks of the front steps, and I bring that package inside.
And once again, it's the same wrong thing.
I ask permission to send it back for a refund, and I order the same item from Target, hoping they will send the thing I want.
But the early snow jogged my shopping; there is time to correct mistakes without a hint of panic.
I start on boyos' Book Flood wishlists, and I realize I am humming, enthusiastically but horribly, some Trans-Siberian Orchestra tunes.
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James and I go out to run errands, and we notice a shift in the retail world. Pumpkin everything has not disappeared, but it's receding. Egg nog options are popping up alongside.
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I read about "9 Enchanting First Snow Day Traditions" at montanahappy.com, thinking I might be able to incorporate—maybe as a family pod, maybe by myself—some first snow traditions into these Fall days.
The author suggests sitting outside and toasting the snow with champagne, snuggled in blankets and munching, perhaps, on cheese tray goodies or smoked salmon sandwiches.
(I imagine this.
"Want to go outside and raise a glass to the first snowfall?" I see myself asking Mark.
"NO," I hear Mark answer.
Ah, well. There are eight more ideas.)
For example: the first snow might be the day one trades smooth cold cotton sheets for toasty flannel ones. I think James, who likes his world to be very toasty, might enjoy that switch, and I make a note to look for fitted flannel options. (Personally, I LIKE the smooth coolness of cotton, like the way the bed linens warm up as I snuggle, like the air around me to be a little cool as I read my way into the warmth of sleep. I'll personally pass on this one, too, but it's a great idea.)
A picnic, MontanaHappy suggests, in a sweet snowy place,--a picnic with a thermos of steaming soup, crusty rustic bread, a jug of apple cider. Maybe one could use an old wooden sled as a table. One could bring a stack of warm blankets for all members of the party to snuggle in.
Here again, though, I suspect I'd only need to bring the one.
Make snow angels, suggests the site, and write the date, in snow, on the wings. Then snap photos each year.
I like that idea in theory. The reality, though, is that, under the fluffy, unbroken, whiteness of the first significant snowfall, there hides evidence of deer visits. Lots of deer visits.
I am not lying down in evidence of deer visits.
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But here are some things I might do on the first day of snow:
- I might get everyone to guess how much snow we'll get that winter. We'll put the predictions in an envelope to open at the end of the season. The person whose guess is closest gets some kind of prize—chooses a movie to see, plans the menu for a special meal, gets an outing of their choice.
- I might celebrate with special snow day food. The article suggests pancakes and shows photos of perfect pancakes shaped like snowmen. (James called pancakes Pan Kings when he was a wee one. We'd make Mickey Mouse pancakes some days, back then. Other times, we'd make initial pancakes—puffy J's and M's and P's…pancakes that looked like the bubble writing popular in the sixties and seventies.) Pancakes—maybe not snowman-shaped so much, but pancakes, anyway---might be a great tradition to start on First Snow Day. I can even make gluten free pancakes; here's a first snow marker we can all enjoy and share.
- Play snow music, and maybe, dance, suggests Happy Montana.com (I'm picturing proposing a snow dance to Mark: "No," he says.) But the music! We could play "Let it Snow." And I look up 'snow music' and find a list on www.timeout.com. There, Andrew Frisciano suggests starting with Simon and Garfunkel's "Hazy Shade of Winter," and then moving on to a list of intriguing titles I've never heard of. I'm looking them up, though. I REALLY want to listen to "Fifteen Feet of Pure White Snow" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, for instance.
- Finally, Montanahappy.com suggests taking photos of the first snow, and I like that idea, too. That creative person suggests making snow igloos and posing favorite plushies within. Or making still lives in the pristine snow, with greenery and pinecones. Maybe some holly from the backyard trees; this year, the holly tree at the end of the drive is lush with gaudy carmen-colored berries…
And Krissy of B-Inspired Mama (b-isnpiredmama.com) proposes making 'Snowman Soup" to mark the eventful first snowfall. Her 'soup' is really hot chocolate, steaming in a mug, and embellished with marshmallow cream and tiny marshmallows, those crispy cookies rolled up in a tube, candy eyes, and maybe, if one could find them, things like a licorice mustache or a cookie tuke.
What fun! (Here, though, really: we'd all look at the 'soup' with delight, let it grow cold, and pour it, finally, down the insinkerator. We are a band, I'm afraid, of hot chocolate disdainers.)
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But there you go: some things make one person happy; other things light up another. I should, again, be mindful; I should think about the little rituals that might make ME smile, make me note the season's changing, the world's kind of relaxation into the snowy part of the year.
MARK those changes, instead of just grumbling about them.
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Thomas and Susan packed up their rig and hit the road again on Thursday morning; they are headed for the sunny southwest; they won't return to their home in Western New York until April. It's quite possible that the wimpy Ohio snow of their visit here may be the only snow they see in Winter 2023-2024. (No bets on that one, though; we have pictures from Chautauqua County, New York, of round bundles of kids happily slapping together Easter snow people; snow there in April would not be unheard of; not at ALL.)
James and I used part of an unscheduled Friday to dust off the box of Thanksgiving decorations from its basement lair, and to decorate the kitchen shelf and mantel. We have returned the Van Gogh bear prints to the family room wall; those snow-loving creatures stare down benevolently on Mark's lounge chair, mindless of the little birds nesting on their heads.
On Sunday, we will change time again, slipping out of Daylight Savings Time into Standard time…and thus, gaining an hour of sleep, another reason to celebrate this time of year. (I am reading that Ohio might stop doing this, staying on Daylight Savings Time all year, or, maybe, opting for Standard Time year 'round, instead. Experts debate the health benefits of the shift, and I will miss the Falling Back hour, but I wouldn't lament the Springing Forward sleepy-time loss. It's probably better for our circadian rhythms to stop adjusting time in November and April, even though a signifier that says, "Hello! Winter is just about here!" will be lost.)
This morning, on this National Sandwich Day, I downloaded a recipe for tomato bisque from Rosemarie's Kitchen, a blog I follow (https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/109049102/posts/4971842837). Rosemarie writes about the tradition most Catholic former-kids of a certain age in the US can relate to: Friday lunches being, often, canned tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich (American cheese on cheap white bread; Comfort Food 101.) She suggests an upgrade to both soup and sandwich, and her upgrades sound delicious.
I may make that soup tonight: it has snowed, and it is now soup-simmering weather.
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It doesn't matter that the sun is out, or that, starting this weekend, the highs will climb into the sixties. It has snowed.
Some folks say that this will be a winter of record snowfalls, citing woolly bears and other innate wisdom. And then, I read a piece last week opining that, this being an El Nino year, the winter will be unusually warm.
It doesn't matter which way it happens, or even if some other, third way, is how this winter descends.
It has snowed. Some bets are off, but others, new ones, are on.
The first snow has fallen. And all the rules are changed.
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