Snow day!
When I was little, snow days meant creeping out of bed on a necessarily frozen morning, stealing across the cold hard wood floors of my bedroom, and turning on the radio until the music stopped and the announcer recited the schools that were closed. “Ontario Schools” was, of course, always somewhere in the middle, leaving one on tenterhooks until that pivotal moment. Those lucky kids in Bucyrus and Crestline and Galion. The extra minutes of my childhood given to that mid-alphabetical listing!
Today, both my husband and I received a phone call and an email from the school district at 5:09am, followed by an email from our elementary school at 5:19am. And for good measure, while still warm in bed, I tugged my cell phone up from the floor by its charging cord, and pulled up the 9news website to see it in print as well. And went back to bed for an hour.
Snow days have magic to them, even if there’s more technology in their delivery. I’m lucky to work in a job where a snow day just means a work-from-home day, and so I never quite got dressed today, although I added a layer and fuzzy socks, and my car never left the driveway, although I did clear it off, in preparation for my life resuming tomorrow. But one aspect of snow days that has evolved since I was a student is parenting a snow day.
My oldest woke up a little after 9. She received the Harry Potter books from her uncle on New Year’s Eve (otherwise known as the Final Gifts of Christmas), and she has since then worked through the first two, starting on the third. She occasionally surfaces to note what she prefers from the books, and what she thinks the movies did well. She hasn’t even watched tv in two days, she told me, which probably I should have noticed, and encouraged, for myself. But for the most part, Child 1: snow day, sorted. And since voracious reading is how I would spend a snow day, both then and now, I feel good about it.
Which leaves Child 2.
“Mom, where’s my ruler from picture day, so I can measure the snow?”
“Mom, can I have a pickle? Mom? Can you open the jar? Do you need a knife to bang on it?”
“Mom, how do you spell creepy crawly? I’m writing a story.”
“There’s nothing to do!!” (It’s 10am)
“Mom! I cut myself with the orange peeler! It’s bleeding!” (How? Just… how?)
“But you said I could spend my money at the Dollar Store tomorrow.” “No. I said, Maybe tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow doesn’t mean tomorrow.” “You said tomorrow!”
“Is there enough internet for your work and for Netflix? Can you find me Animal Buddies?”
And finally, “I swear if you don’t get off your sister this instant, you’re going to spend the rest of the day in your room. I mean it, chica. Don’t test me.”
Well, that last one was me. Possibly said in not my magical snow day voice.
When we were in Minnesota for the holidays, my brother-in-law mentioned that they’d had school the week before with a -45 degree windchill (real temps, -23). And then and now, I thought that was crazy. Partly because I can’t even imagine -45 degrees, windchill or not, and I don’t understand how such places stay populated, even by enthusiastic winter warriors. But I also thought, snow days shouldn’t be so hard won. They should be like the 10th free purchase at the frozen yogurt store, or the $5 reward at the liquor store. Sure, it doesn’t happen every day, but both have definitely happened in recent memory and will again.
Even as an adult, snow days are rewards in the non-sugared cereal box. They are reminders that there are some things we can’t control in life (nature is a big one) and that’s not so bad. Somehow we got suckered into adulting – we maybe even perhaps sprinted there, thinking we were in a hurry – and snow days are reminders that we can sometimes drop that ball, and just stare out the window for a while, hot mug in hand and old college sweatshirt on, while nature holds the cards.
Yes, I got less done than I would have in the office. Yes, I thought my head might explode a couple of times, with the potpourri of questions that fell faster than the temperatures. And no, my house is no cleaner than it was at 5:09am this morning. But snow days are snow days.
When I asked my youngest what the best part of her snow day was, she replied, “The best part? Was figuring out it was a snow day, and being with you.”
So she didn’t have to creep across a winter bedroom tundra, and even if she had, her school district begins with “D,” so she’s still got it made. But that pearly magic moment, when one moment you were hopeful but uncertain, and the next your whole soul lifts to the unexpected day off, that moment of snow day realization is still magic, no matter how we hear it.
And maybe she remembers our cell phone app yoga practice more than my ultimatums. Because now when I think back about the day, my favorite part was feeling her hand find mine during Shavasana, while we both just let routine flow over and around us, stretched out in complete repose. And isn’t that the entire point of a snow day?