Snow Pain, Snow Gain

Since moving to Cranberry, I’m happy to report that I’ve been involved in a new relationship.

With snow.

Until recently, snow and I were in the honeymoon phase. I had never met anything like snow before, at least not in the quantities I’m used to now, and everything about it was magical to me.

I loved the way the woods behind my house looked covered in it, the way big clumps of snow drifted past the window and especially the crunching sound snow made underneath my boots.

I know now that part of the reason snow and I had such a magical time together was because I only passively loved it. I never had to leave my house and drive around in it, and so our love blossomed—until last week.

Monday afternoon was the first time I really had to drive around in the snow. Unfortunately, my house has a one-car garage and we have two cars. This means my sad little Corolla from California has to sit outside. So after a weekend of near-constant snowing, there was about a 5-inch-thick layer of that white crap covering my whole car.

This is where snow and I got into our first fight.

At first, I calmly reached into the car door, grabbed my ice scraper and casually pushed away bits of snow on the windshield. However, after a few minutes I grew more and more frustrated as the thick chunks of snow continued to spill across the windows and my hand became numb. I realized it wasn’t going to end soon, and I knew it meant war.

I reached into my purse for my mittens and went ballistic on the snow.

For 15 minutes, I hacked away at chunks of slushy snow like a rainforest hiker hacking through tropical vines, all while muttering every profanity that made it to my lips.

By the end of this, I was covered in snow and with no time left to change. I had clearly lost the battle. I drove to my meeting with the snow I couldn’t reach still on the top of my car, giving it the appearance of having a flat top. Eventually, it flew off in pieces onto the road and cars driving behind me (Sorry minivan!).

It wasn’t fun, but I’m glad it happened. Relationships aren’t easy, and now I have a more realistic expectation of snow. You can’t hold people, or in this case snow, on a pedestal.

I do still love it though, and I look forward to the next time I see it. Plus, next time I’ll win.