A silent flight of frozen flakes
Whirls and twirls in frosty lace
A grand ballet between the trees
Dancing light upon the breeze
A smooth ciseaux, one final leap
Each one lands and falls asleep.
As we were walking home from church on Sunday, November 21, we noticed there were a few snowflakes in the air. When we awoke on Monday morning, the air felt a little colder than usual. There was a thin, sparse coat of white that frosted the ground outside our windows and a constant flow of the same white power floating down from the heavens. I was so giddy. I warmed some tea and sat by the window in my bathrobe watching it for a while - I could have stared all day.
Of course my butterfly-bellied excitement wasn't a common reaction in our snow-phobic metropolitan. The city nearly shut down when "Snow-pocolypse" hit. People were stranded and cars were deserted all over the city. The hill up to Queen Anne was completely closed off and showcased an abandoned car perfectly intersecting the median at a 45 degree angle. You might have seen the video someone recorded from Capitol Hill of a bus that skid on the icey streets and collided into a telephone pole. The bus lines were hours behind schedule and people all over the city were in a panic.
But you have to understand my excitement over this snow. I'm sure you've seen real snow before... but this was no regular snow. What the fluff that floated in the air that morning looked more like was the fake snow you see in movies. It wasn't crunchy or hard, but... well, perfect. All suspended in the air like feathers resisting their final landing.
That night I felt inspired to buy some goods that I could bake to warm up the house. So I bundled myself up to brace the cold as I walked to the Safeway down the street. It was stunning outside. It literally took my breath away as I walked (and giggled) myself down the sidewalk. Usually Seattle's streets are riddled with pedestrians until well after midnight - even in the winter, but it was as quiet as a ghost town before nine o'clock. The snow hadn't stopped for a moment since that morning - and as the cars were ditched and people took cover indoors, the usual hubbub around town died down to the gentle whisper of the gales carrying more batches of that perfect white powder.
It was such a delightful little treat before Thanksgiving. We got to celebrate with our neighbors, JP and Bree, and we all welcomed the Christmas season in together - sipping on egg nog and watching A Christmas Story while the snow still sparkled outside. It was pretty perfect timing, too, because Maurice got to shoot a video of JP for the Mars Hill Downtown blog in the snow. The B-rolls they shot outside are gorgeous, but more than that, they capture the beauty and quiet solitude of JP's worshipful repentance.
Happy winter days, friends!
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