snow

It's been snowing here all day. Big, fluffy flakes, sometimes floating gently down, sometimes driven diagonally by the wind. I've been watching the snow accumulate, forming a rounded extension of the railing visible from my office window, a fluffy blanket covering the balcony outside the back door. Now in the darkness that follows dusk, flecks here and there catch and reflect the light of streetlamps, reminiscent of the shiny bits in Formica.


A friend said the other day that if it's going to be cold, she'd rather have it be cold with snow. I think I'd have to agree. When it's just cold--achingly, bone-chillingly cold--it feels like punishment. But when it snows, the cold almost becomes forgivable, or at least forgetable, for it's no longer the main attraction. Snow steals the show. It makes the world look soft and pure. It causes headaches on highways and runways. It makes us dig out our sunglasses in the middle of winter. It crunches or squeaks underfoot.

Cold is just there and we resent it. Snow demands our attention. And though we may grumble at the extra time spent cleaning off our cars or getting home from work, I think there's still a part of us--sometimes buried very deep inside--that gets caught up in the wonder of snow. Of no two flakes ever the same. Of the possibility and memories of snowmen, snowball fights, snow forts and snow angels. Of its incredible whiteness.

"Come now, let us reason together," says the Lord. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow."