Snow day
The weather outside is frightful, and yet I still had to go to work.
Remmber the anticipation after a major winter storm - flipping between radio stations and tv channels trying to make sure, really sure, that your school hadn't been cancelled yet?
I used to feel sorry for people down in Florida who'd never seen a snow day. How could they ever understand the wonder of scraping together a snowball when you should be scraping away with a pencil?
Then I heard a story from a friend of mine who moved a great deal growing up. By the time he graduated college, he'd lived in approximately 39 cities scattered throughout the country (with one stop in a small Pacific Island country). Among the places he piled his possessions (allitteration rocks!) was the Sunshine State.
He told me a tale of one winter day in elementary school. Evidently it had gotten rather cold in Florida that night (cold being a relative temprature, in this case probably like 32). he arrived at his classroom, having lived in colder states to the north he didn't think anything of the cold weather, he arrived to find everyone excited about the weather. Kids and teacher alike were marvelling over the frosted landscape. Eventually, the teachers attempted to regain some semblance of order, only to fail.
what happened next has always been a surreal scene in my mind. Usually played back in slow motion with some early 90s pop-grunge - Meat Puppets or James or something - accompaniament. To those of us just about everywehre else, frost is a part of life. It happens. To them, it was a major event. The teachers, having failed to gain the attention of the classroom, resorted to the age old method of letting the kids tire themselves out on the playground. So imagine - in slow motion with poppy guitar playing in the background - a group of kids in overly heavy coats sliding across the frosted grass. Laying on their backs on the lawn and attempting snow angels and trying to scrape together enough frost to make a snow ball.
I no longr feel sorry for Floridians, as I'm here enjoying the 13 degree days of snow and they're stuck sweating it out with a tropical drink and short sleeves on the deck of boat in February. No, I no longer feel sorry for these poor souls, because I know that, deep down beneath the layers of suntan oil, even they are enjoying a snow day.
Remmber the anticipation after a major winter storm - flipping between radio stations and tv channels trying to make sure, really sure, that your school hadn't been cancelled yet?
I used to feel sorry for people down in Florida who'd never seen a snow day. How could they ever understand the wonder of scraping together a snowball when you should be scraping away with a pencil?
Then I heard a story from a friend of mine who moved a great deal growing up. By the time he graduated college, he'd lived in approximately 39 cities scattered throughout the country (with one stop in a small Pacific Island country). Among the places he piled his possessions (allitteration rocks!) was the Sunshine State.
He told me a tale of one winter day in elementary school. Evidently it had gotten rather cold in Florida that night (cold being a relative temprature, in this case probably like 32). he arrived at his classroom, having lived in colder states to the north he didn't think anything of the cold weather, he arrived to find everyone excited about the weather. Kids and teacher alike were marvelling over the frosted landscape. Eventually, the teachers attempted to regain some semblance of order, only to fail.
what happened next has always been a surreal scene in my mind. Usually played back in slow motion with some early 90s pop-grunge - Meat Puppets or James or something - accompaniament. To those of us just about everywehre else, frost is a part of life. It happens. To them, it was a major event. The teachers, having failed to gain the attention of the classroom, resorted to the age old method of letting the kids tire themselves out on the playground. So imagine - in slow motion with poppy guitar playing in the background - a group of kids in overly heavy coats sliding across the frosted grass. Laying on their backs on the lawn and attempting snow angels and trying to scrape together enough frost to make a snow ball.
I no longr feel sorry for Floridians, as I'm here enjoying the 13 degree days of snow and they're stuck sweating it out with a tropical drink and short sleeves on the deck of boat in February. No, I no longer feel sorry for these poor souls, because I know that, deep down beneath the layers of suntan oil, even they are enjoying a snow day.
posted by Chris at 3:46 PM
1 Comments:
Yeah. We love days with one inch of snow! EVERYTHING shuts down because we can't drive on ice. Oh, and yesterday is was 70 here. We're wearing flip-flops and T-shirts! I may even head to the beach next weekend! Windows down! Radio blaring!
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