Not All Who Wander Are Lost

Just in time, really, and under the best possible circumstances, as snowday Fridays turn a single unexpected latesleep-and-family into a long weekend of the same.

For a while there it looked like it wouldn't happen -- it's a tough call for any district Superintendent to cancel too early, lest s/he look like an overeager mismanager when the storm turns away at the last minue, and the first flakes of this one didn't hit until 5:30 this morning, the time when the call usually gets made one way or another.

But the weather report got worse, not better, going in, and the spectre of trapped-in-school or, worse, at-fault for early dismissal slip-and-slide accidents, proved too much to resist; in the end, there was our district on the local TV station's online closure compendium; after a quick wood furnace reload, back to bed in the stilldarkness I went.

A good thing, too. By the time I finally re-awoke at 9, the fall could be measured in whippedwhite inches; by the time the three-year and I hit the sled for a quick neighborhood checkout we were slogging through eight inches of perfect fluffiness and white-out conditions. Home again after ten minutes -- I had to crawl up the slippery driveway, lugging the kid-laden sled behind me -- we were snowmen ourselves, ready for cocoa and crackers by the roaring fire.

We fired the plowguy, by the way, since it was he who had caused the iceout conditions on the driveway when he tried unsuccessfully to get his new truck up the hill. Wonderwife found another service which, for the same cost, would also shovel, salt, and sand; by the time the snow began to slow an hour ago, they had shown, cleared, smiled, and left with a check and promise of another round of salt later this afternoon, so we got that going for us.

Now the sun's come out just in time to set. We play beneath the just-decorated tree, purchased yesterday from the farm down the road and bungee-tied home with little difficulty, a strategy which the farmer himself approved of as much easier than rope, in't it? Aglow in the lights of sunset-on-snow and slowly twinkling tree, the baby practices her diphthongs ('ait? 'aight?) and the cardinal hops appreciative from feeder to feeder, the whole world bright red on white and branch like a Christmas card: The house is warm against the winterwind; the hearth is cozy as can be, and all is right with the winterworld.