Monday, April 6, 2009

It Snowed


It Snowed.*

It rained all day Friday, a not particularly cold rain, that didn’t slack off until after dark. John and I cancelled plans for a day trip on Saturday because the rain was to continue, and possibly become snow in the north Georgia mountains, our intended destination. Saturday, however, though the day remained overcast, it never rained.

Sunday, however, we woke to rain again, and cold. I pulled on my husband’s giant insulated camouflage jacket and felt swallowed by the warmth of it as I trekked the 100 yards or so down our driveway to retrieve the Sunday paper. I kept staring at the grassy field in front of the house. It looked funny in this rain, and then I realized the field was covered in tiny ice pellets. Although it was raining now, at some point early this morning there had been hail.

Back inside the house I mentioned my discovery to John and then busied myself with morning activities. The sound of the rain on the roof moved from my conscious awareness into the background of other things stealing my attention away.

It was sometime after breakfast, as I sat reading the paper, that I noticed the silence. The rain had stopped. I looked up at the window expecting to see a slight reprieve from the rain. Imagine my surprise therefore, when I saw snow falling in huge, almost giant flakes. I haven’t seen snow in the five years that I have lived here on the farm, 40 miles east of Atlanta. I haven’t seen snow since I left my beloved North Carolina mountains 14 years ago.

I was in my late 30s when I went to Appalachian State University in Boone, NC to finish my undergraduate degree. I found a two-bedroom basement apartment on a horse farm in nearby Zionville that I just loved. It was twelve miles from the campus party noise, and big enough for my large personal library to live outside of boxes and long-term storage.

In the summertime, I found to my delight, I could pull up a lawn chair outside the garage and watch hang gliders coming off Grandfather Mountain land in a small field a mere few feet from the driveway. There was also the neighbor who drove his horse-drawn covered wagon past my apartment almost daily. I always watched for him on those mornings when I was home, and when I invited my extended family for a visit one Thanksgiving weekend, this kind neighbor very generously came by to give my family a wagon ride at no cost other than the joy of the experience, and our thanks.

In the wintertime the horse farm became a place of absolute wonder. As old as I was, I anticipated each new snowfall like a child. The snow would come as early as October, and as the season progressed, it came deeper and deeper. The silence deepened as well, as traffic on the nearby highway lessened, and disappeared almost completely from the small mountain road that meandered past the farm. I delighted in watching the horses play in the snow, and marveled at the deep, clean whiteness that filled the dark barren places in the mountains around me, glistening in the sunlight when the soft flakes slowed and stopped, and the skies cleared from gray to blue. It was then, when the weather was clear, that I could see the ski trails at Sugarloaf Mountain.

In my final year at Appalachian, late one winter night, as I left the library and began walking across campus toward my car, I realized there might not be many more nights like this one. After graduation I would be leaving, heading for the coast to join my family. I would probably never see this much snow again.

The snow was a good foot deep that night, and more snow was falling. My senses sharpened in the moment. I became acutely aware of everything, and I took it all in like an unexpected gift suddenly handed to me. I watched my breath escaping my lips in cloudy bursts, and studied their flowing movement against the dark night sky. I inhaled deeply the cold air, felt it sting in my nostrils and warm as it entered my lungs. I listened to the soft crunch of snow beneath my boots as I took each step slowly and deliberately. I glanced up at a streetlight and studied the flakes falling in a slow motion dance beneath the gentle glow of light, and closed my eyes as I felt the flakes falling on my face, collecting on my eyelashes. I stuck out my tongue and tasted a few cold flakes as they landed on my warm wet tongue and melted.

I stood still and listened to the silence that snow always brings. I listened to the earth tucking quietly in beneath a new layer of snow to sleep until morning, and perhaps, if it could, dream of a warm spring. I listened to the snow as it fell gently to the ground, and imagined each flake to have been a dream, a hope, a prayer that had lifted to heaven, and having been received, was now released to return, transformed, falling to earth, I imagined, as a quiet, faithful promise.

I didn’t expect the snow on Sunday to continue very long. I certainly didn’t expect it to accumulate to anything more than a dusting. As I glanced out the window throughout the day, I continued to be amazed – at the size of the downy flakes, at their tenacity as they kept falling, and at their beauty as they accumulated en mass over the roads, the grass, the trees, and the cars.
The snow on Sunday was another unexpected gift, handed to me without warning or ceremony, but more valuable than it seemed. I made a memory of the day, and the snow, and I will cherish it always.

(This blog was intended to be posted March 6. Computer problems, et al delayed that.)