First snow is beautiful

The snow is so pretty when it first coats everything. Mounds of white dampen the sounds of the usual noises. The harsh scraping of a truck plowing the streets is far more welcome than that of the summer car radios that threaten to deafen everyone and rattle our windows to the point where I’m afraid they will break.

We had a bit of disagreement this morning. Each of us was determined to shovel out the driveway because we were worried about the other one. I didn’t want him to have another heart attack and he didn’t want me to make my own problems worse. We both shoveled and we are both just fine.

Most of the snow has now been relocated to the edges of the driveway. Maybe the sidewalks will get cleared today or maybe not. My daughter has offered to send the kids up here so they can experience real snow first hand. I told her they ought be able to earn air fare back to Texas by shoveling most of the sidewalks and driveways in Portland. I wonder if the post office would notice if she put the kids in a box and mailed them?

With all the screeching noises I heard as the snow was falling yesterday, I was sure somebody would end up in the flower bed. I haven’t yet gotten out there to check. I did notice tire tracks between the speed limit sign on the edge of our property and the telephone pole a few feet away. I’m not sure if somebody slid coming out of the alley or if they just missed the driveway. They almost made it to the sidewalk. We have enough snow cleared away that people should be able to see where the road ends. I’m glad that nobody has run into anything, yet.

I am so happy that I don’t have to go anywhere for a few days. The first real snow of the season seems to take people by surprise. It takes a bit of slipping and sliding before they realize that they should slow down a bit and drive less aggressively. I would rather wait until most of it melts off the streets before I venture out. Besides, I drive like an old woman, which irritates people who need to get somewhere right now.

Staying home is not always an option if one has a job outside of the home. Most places frown on people who stay home every time Mother Nature has a hissy fit and sprinkles snowflakes over the landscape. Then there are the ever popular fog, pouring rain, treacherous ice, and any of a number of other things that make an ordinary trip to work an adventure. I did that for many years. Now I can simply send something into the cosmos and it will magically appear on paper.

By this time next week the novelty of the recent snowfall will have worn off. Instead of a calming white, the snow that is left will have turned an ugly gray with black speckles. The warm weather we had at the beginning of winter will be a distant memory as we wish for spring.

I think I’ll try to unearth the sidewalk before it gets colder or I run out of energy. I think today or tomorrow are supposed to the the warm days this week.

Yes, I know temperatures in the 20’s and low 30’s aren’t exactly warm. However, it is better than a forecast of below zero temperatures with frigid wind.

For today, the snow is beautiful but it would be even prettier if it would stay off the streets and sidewalks.