Snow in New York!

Wow! Finally we have snow! The streets are full of fluffy powder, and the flakes parachute from the sky. A dog dives into the foot high drifts formed by the early morning snow plows and emerges with a beard. School has been cancelled and the kids yank their parents hard by the hand while pulling their sleds. Some of the smaller children momentarily disappear as they slip and toddle into a packed mound. The doormen smile approvingly. Everyone knows that snow in February is just so perfect, so okay, so healthy. While some people still have to irritatingly scurry to work, most are forming an unevenly spaced, and slightly random, but steady procession to Central Park. There a vast whiteness paints the landscape into winter, and the cold crystals settle onto branches, rocks, and benches. The landscape has been layered with a clean healthy dose of February percipitation reassuring our worried minds and nurturing the earth that was just a bit too dry for this time of year. Up on the hill, we shared our sled with some adult visitors from England. "Oh My God," they said, "Our plane leaves tonight and we can't believe we are here in the snow, and I've never done this in my life, and we just have to, do you mind, just a bit, if we have a go?" Of course not. Dressed in tourist's frocks, belly-down, they hurled themselves to the bottom of the hill. Now it was my turn. After insisting that my children wear triple layers, I realized that I had failed to do so myself. My toes grew stiff and numb but still we slid crookedly, and straight, sometimes with collision, over and over again until the childrens' faces all gleamed with smiles, and with the blush of exhiliration upon their cheeks. I chatted with someone who told me that George Washington was the first sustainable farmer. Of course, I thought. Here in the city that never sleeps we dream of milk that comes in a bottle, vegetables grown upon the land and a President who respected the environment's boundaries -- not to mention times when the sharing of a sled was the most natural thing in the world. When we were ready to leave, we piled snow on the sled and dragged it home. Upstairs, we dumped it into the sink, and ladeled it into large mugs, mixed in some fresh cream and maple syrup, and enjoyed our snow creams. We looked out upon the chilly skyline adorned in its favorite fur --- a lapel of snow and ice. Everything was just as it should be. We are all quietly relieved.