Snow

One late summer day my parents took me to visit my paternal grandparents in Timmins, a small town located above the tundra line. After a week of calling on old friends and neighbors, my parents hopped in the car and unceremoniously waved goodbye to me. Wait. . . what? I was five years old.

And so I went to Kindergarten in Timmins. October brought the first snow and the snow seemingly never stopped. I was less than four feet tall so in short time the snow was piled higher than me. It was ordinary to walk to school through snow gulleys so deep that I could not see over them. I counted on my very lanky grandfather to navigate us through the snow canyons. For fun, I would walk right into a snow drift, then wait inside my little igloo until my grandfather found me.

High school winters brought tobogganing parties. Winston Churchill Park provided a two tier tobogganing ride that could launch an errant rider into the stratosphere if the toboggan was not carefully navigated. Fortunately, the deep snow provided a cushion for a somewhat safe, albeit ungainly, landing. City snow was unlike country snow. It was just as pretty while falling but did not provide the same quiet peace of a country road. Nonetheless, I still had to crunch through it (five miles, uphill, both ways) to get to school.

All grown up and living in Los Angeles, I learned to ski on the aptly named Mammoth Mountain; 11 thousand feet high and 3.5 thousand acres of ski runs, although, ironically, the only people who appeared to know about it were the denizens of Los Angeles. While waiting in a lift line, the common question strangers would ask each other was “what part of LA are you from?” 

Annually, we would spend a week long vacation at other ski resorts in the Rockies. During one trip, after occupying the day skiing the various slopes of Aspen, we ended, as pretty much did everyone, at the Little Nell outdoor pub for some well earned hot munchies and cold adult beverages. After a few toddies, the couple with whom we were sharing our vacation suggested a visit to a local shop to look at an outrageously expensive ski outfit. Still dressed in our heavy ski gear, we ambled awkwardly to the shop, the inside temperature of which was the equivalent of a sauna. In a very short while, the combination of roasting indoor temperature, the smell of ski resin, the sweaty ski outfit and full bodied toddies left me much hotter than was at all comfortable so I wended my way outside to enjoy the cold air. It happened to be the blue hour of the day. Aspen village was covered in the silver grey blanket of dusk. Twinkle lights surrounding shopfront windows punctuated the landscape and cast a soft glow on the snow covered grounds. To a less than sober individual, the tableaux was magical. I was taken with the glittery glamor of the moment and delightedly wandered through it. The shops were beautiful and ‘exclusive’. One jewelry shop had an exquisite lapis lazuli watch displayed in the window. Cold sober I would have kept walking, but I was not, so I did not. I entered and asked to purchase the watch, handing my credit card to the keep. The watch was quickly polished and activated on my behalf, then placed on my wrist. While I admired it, the folded receipt and card were quietly slipped to me, after which I was quickly shown the door. As I walked out, still admiring my new purchase, my husband and friends called to me, having been searching for me with some concern. I eagerly showed them my new watch. My girlfriend greatly admired it while my husband asked about the price. The price? Uh, I wasn’t sure. Both men looked through my pockets for the receipt while my girlfriend continued to express admiration and, of course, wanted one too. As she and I looked back at the shop, the keep was pulling down the shades, turning off the lights and turning on the sign that said “Closed" while beneath it, in smaller type read "No returns - no refunds”. 

I do believe the term for this moment is “snow blind”.