Finally, A Real Minnesota Snow!

I love it when the big snow storms come because just about everything STOPS. The streets grow quiet, the schools close, town meetings are cancelled and rescheduled; it snows and it snows, and the sounds grow muffled and the streets and drives fill up, and people listen to radios wondering what will happen next. They have a few drinks, watch TV, read, play on computers, cook and then sit around with their families and eat.




A daughter may come home from Colorado--perhaps on a broom--the storm following in her wake. Her mother may realize she has given birth to a Goddess.



Upon waking at noon on a day when just about everything will continue to be closed, one hears the muffled groans of snowblowers, the growling of plows, and people are clutching brooms and shovels up and down the blocks, talking, digging together. Everybody comes out to dig; it is a great digging celebration.




And that's when we confront the things that did not yet get done: bicycles that didn't get put away, and slung over them, garden hoses, that now cannot be touched until they thaw. . .which could happen in five days or five months. Who knows? (Many say, "Wait five minutes.")



And the world becomes so lovely. Designs a person never noticed are suddenly embossed. The garden hose has been laying in such attractive coils. . .



and the bittersweet is frosted,

and the potted plants have all put on Russian hats,



and every single little bell--a nation of little bells--wears a crown.