Snow Days

Dear George, 

We’ve just had our second snowfall of the month, a frosty reminder the we’ve reached the thick of winter.  According to Google, over one septillion snowflakes fall in the U.S. every year.  I didn’t even know what one septillion is, but it turns out it has 24 zeroes.  That’s a trillion billion, more than all the grains of sand on earth or all the gallons of water.  As adults we tend to forget just how astonishing snow is.  Among other things, it falls out of the sky.  Second, though each snowflake is tinier than a ladybug, a good snowfall blankets the earth, often spreading over thousands of square miles.  Snow not only turns the whole world white, but there are endless things to do with it.  Roll in it, slide on it, eat it, make snow angels, ski and sled, build sculptures, throw snowballs at the tree trunk, etc.  Having grown up in the U.P., snow was a dominant part of our lives.  Here are a few snow memories in honor of the season.    

KINDERGARTEN.  In my early childhood my parents and I lived on the second floor of a big white house on Ogden Avenue at the foot of the Interstate Bridge, and my friend Sally F. and her parents lived in the first floor.  At age 5 Sally and I walked the half-mile to kindergarten at Boswell School every day, and in the winter this often meant trudging through drifts of snow.  We were all bundled up with boots and scarves but it was still freezing.  Fortunately Sally’s dad owned the Boiler Works on Ogden Ave. which was midway on our route, and we’d stop in each morning to drink hot cocoa and warm our hands and mittens at the potbelly stove.  I don’t remember anything about my kindergarten classes, but I do remember our snowy journeys to and fro.  

SNOW WARS.  Our family moved to Sheridan Road when I was in first grade.  My friends Frankie S., Darl S., and I built a good-sized snow fort at the curb in front of our house, and several older neighborhood kids built an enemy fort on the opposite side of the street.  We lobbed snowballs at each other for hours, even if nobody ever managed to hit the other guys.     

PLAYGROUND TACKLE.  As soon as snow covered our Washington Grade School playground, the boys would play tackle at recess.  One of the more athletic kids was chose as a runner, and all the other kids would chase him until somebody tackled him in the snow.  The tackler then became the runner, and everybody chased after him.  The crowning moment of my youth was when Tommy H., the halfback on our school’s football team, ran straight at me and, to everyone’s amazement, I actually managed to tackle him.  I didn’t do very well as a runner, probably lasting about twenty seconds.  I didn’t care.   I’d had my day.  

ALL AGAINST ONE.  One of the boys a year younger than me lived in the house right across the street from the playground.  On winter days he’d come out in his yard during lunch hour, and all the boys would thrown snowballs at him from across the street.  He successfully dodged most of them.  However, when everybody threw their snowballs simultaneously at the count of three at least a few would hit the target.  The kid didn’t mind in the least.  He loved being the center of attention even if it was a matter of collective aggression.  

ON THE RIVER.  We moved out of town to our house on the river when my dad came back to the war.  Playing in the snow became even more of a full-time occupation.  We’d ski off the river bank, hike across the ice to Pig Island, and walk with snowshoes in the forest.  My dad tied the toboggan to the back bumper of the Lincoln V-12 and pulled us along the snow and ice on Riverside Boulevard, swerving from one side to the other.  Steve and I played endless hours of basketball on the snow-covered driveway, lighting the hoop at night with a desk lamp attached to an extension cord.  In the morning we ran barefoot races in the snow-covered front yard.  Every winter we tried to build an igloo, but when we got to the center of the roof it would always cave in.  

SNOW DRIVING.  Cruising around town in the family car became our major teenage activity.  I practiced winter driving on Stephenson Avenue near the cemetery, hitting the brakes, and spinning the car in circles as it bounced off the snowdrifts on each side of the road.  One holiday night my friend Bob A. volunteered to take my mother and I to the O’Hara’s house on the Green Bay shore during a major snowstorm.  Halfway there his Model A Ford skidded off the road and tipped over in a ditch.  My mother wound up on top of Bob, and I was laying on top of her.  Too embarrassing.

SNOMANCE.  In my second year at Antioch College I had a coop job in Madison, Wisconsin, and I went to visit college friends in Milwaukee.  Much to my surprise Katja was there with them.  I’d never met her before but had admired her from afar.  We went for a walk in downtown Milwaukee, and the snowflakes started falling.  We stopped on a bridge to watch the snow and the river, and I’d have to say those snowflakes led to love at first sight.     

CLOSED ROADS.  During one of our Xmas breaks my college friend Arnie P. joined me to drive the 600 miles from Yellow Springs, Ohio, to Menominee.  A major storm was raging, and, as we got north of Milwaukee, state troopers had shut down Highway 41.  They explained that all of the highways heading north were closed, with the exception of one two-lane county road which was still open for local traffic.  Disregarding police advice, Arnie and I set out on the county road  with the snow already up to our bumpers.  We never could see the road or its edges but simply pointed the car midway between the evergreen forests on the right and the left.  It took us 6 hours to go 150 miles and we didn’t see a single other car, but we did pull in to Menominee about 3 or 4 a.m. 

SNOW PARENTING.  Snow took on a whole new meaning when I was a new dad in the early 1970’s.  J and I would go sledding at Burnet Woods, or, for still bigger thrills, at Mt. Storm Park with its skyline view and steep hill.  Katja was raising rabbits at the time, and J and I would build a large snow rabbit in our side yard.  Every year, as J got bigger, the snow rabbit got bigger too.  After New Years Eve we’d go around the neighborhood and collect discarded Xmas trees, creating our own forest of a dozen or more trees on our patio deck.  

SNOW DOGS.  Our Old English Sheepdogs, Mike and Duffy, were curious about the snow but I don’t think they were true enthusiasts.  The snow stuck in their paws, and the salt from the roads and sidewalks was painful.  I put socks on them with a rubber band but they never stayed put.  For our best sheepdog outings we joined Donna and Sophie for winter snow hikes at Miami Whitewater Forest.  The down side of the snow season involved the dogs pulling too hard on the leash and me landing on the sidewalk on my rear end.  That probably happened fifty times over the years, but I managed to survive.    

It’s been snowing about six hours since I started these reminiscences, and our street is looking beautiful.  I think I’ll go for a stroll.  

Love,

Dave