. . . and already I'm OVER IT!Sure, for the first couple of years up here, it was cute. It was beautiful. It was wondrous and special. It was white Christmases and sledding and postcard-perfect winter scenes, just like I'd always imagined it would be when I was a kid living in South Texas, enduring 70-degree Christmas days and such.
But now? After five PA winters, I'm kinda tired of it. Sure, it's still beautiful and wondrous, but
--Not at 7:15 in the morning, when I'm digging the car out from under a night's snowfall.
--Not when I can't park in my driveway anymore because it's a hill, and if I park at the bottom I'll never get back up and out. (Not that I would mind it so much, but my boss might have a little to say about my not coming to work anymore.) Now I have to park in the little pull-off space up top, and I get covered by the snowplows every day.
--Not when I have to drive slowly and carefully, running the wipers constantly, washing the mud and salt off the windshield and trying not to think about the salt eating the car's paint and underside coating, rusting it from beneath.
--Not when the arthritis in my right foot and ankle are really bothering the heck out of me from the first snowfall to the last.
--Not when it starts getting dark at 4:30 in the afternoon.
I'll admit that I still love watching the birds at the feeders in the snow. They stand out against the pure white backdrop like little brown and red and blue gems. However, the light's usually so crappy that it's hard to get a good shot.
I still love looking out at the snow on the trees and the mountainsides, the fields covered with white blankets, the night-glow of reflected white between the clouds and the snow.
But I gotta tell you: this snow business ain't all it's cracked up to be.
12 comments:
Yeah, I remember back-to-back blizzards and snow storms in MD in 96 that kept us house bound for about two weeks...the fun and wonder of it all wore off quickly. Even in DE we had 20 inches in the blizzard of 03. Snow has a way of changing your lifestyle, for sure. During the last snow storm I mentioned, both DH and I were stuck inside the house for three straight days. I had to put the knives away :o)
I still miss the pretty falling snow...
Yikes! Winter hasn't even arrived yet and you're already hoping for it to end. I haven't even gotten the snowshoes out of the closet yet!
Carolyn H.
It is so odd because no snow here in Albany NY yet... but it will be here soon.
Now that I am primarily living with my husband and not on my own, I am happy to not have to shovel my own walkway any more!
Mary, I love watching the snow; I just don't like having to deal with it.
Yeah, Carolyn, I know I'm being whiny, but I'm cold and I'm tired of it!
Fran, sometimes Neighbor Ed plows our driveway, which is sweet, but it never lasts of course. So it's just that much more frustrating for me.
As a SoCal native and admitted weather wuss, I offer condolences. I prefer not to "do" winter (c:
I don't even mind the cold so much, but the snow--and the lack of sunshine--are just a pain.
I wish we could move to South America during the winter and just not think about snow. But until Geoff's book starts flying off the shelves, I have to deal with the crap.
I love the snow. Probably because we get so little of it. But yes, the dark days are murder.
When Ben and I were in Texas recently we wondered how some rancher friends of ours plowed when it snowed as they had no driveway.
(tee hee-it's an inside joke with us that goes back to pondering the steep mountain roads in Jamaica: "how do they get up these in the winter?" -a common contemplation for anyone's driveway in Wisconsin. Not so much further south).
You sound so much like my girlfriend in this post it's almost scary. She hates winter and we only get maybe one or teo snows a year anymore. As soon as it starts gettng dark early and the temps fall below 55 she goes into "hate winter" mode. Me, I like a good snow fall or three but since I don't work anymore it doesn't bother me so much.
We had our first snow today.It would be nice if the snow only stuck to the grass and trees.It looks nice until it mixes with dirt and then it's not so nice any more.
I agree, Larry--it's always white and beautiful until it turns black and muddy.
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