Snow Day

What a difference a week makes! A month! A year! Decades!

Earlier this week I was lamenting how dreary the month of January is. As if she sat up and took notice, five magical words spoken today whisked me back to third grade to remind me of January’s joy: “There’s a chance of snow”! What excitement those days brought! Waiting up with my parents and brothers to hear if school was cancelled. Looking eagerly out the window for any sign of a flake. Running out into the night, of course the best snows always started at night. Hard to believe but back then “inclement weather” was the only time when the girls were allowed to wear ‘pants suits’ and not dresses to school. Even without the snow it would’ve been a cause for celebration! I’d hope beyond all hopes the fluffy white stuff would travel the ninety miles from Shreveport and land on our steps. I could feel it coming. Once in sixth grade there was a January ice storm and we were ‘snow bound’ for over a week.

Snow always moved in from the west, from Shreveport. I could feel it coming, smell it. Shreveport became a mystical “Oz”. I wanted the excitement of ‘snow’ so badly that after college I left Monroe and moved there. I wanted a piece THAT action…for me and someday for my children. Did it snow!!!

In December 1982, the Friday before dismissal for Christmas vacation, I drove to school through a Winter Wonderland with Karen Carpenter playing “Merry Christmas Darling” on the radio. I remember thinking this is what ‘happy’ is. . . driving through the snow listening to Karen Carpenter. On January 22, 1990 I bid Shreveport and my north Louisiana roots goodbye. She graced us with snow the weekend before we left. Magic!

This afternoon, with a prayer and promise we left a south Louisiana school with the same excitement I remembered from my childhood. Sweet smiling faces poised toward puffs. Tonight, with face pressed to the window pane looking at the night sky and eating my mother’s recipe for chili, I waited eagerly for news of cancellations . We got our wish. Snow Day tomorrow…..S.N.O.W…..

Yes it did indeed snow in Shreveport today….and in my hometown of Monroe too! Maybe tonight it’ll snow in Baton Rouge…..I can smell it! Can’t you? January’s looking up, friends. Welcome friend. Welcome snow! And yes, welcome January!! “The woods ARE lovely, dark and deep…..”