Thursday, January 29, 2009

Going to the Snow

Tomorrow I'm going to the snow. When I tell people I'm going to the snow they say, What are you going to do there? Are you going to ski? No. Skis scare me. Snowboards even more so. Looks like a double-leg mangling waiting to happen. I'm not going to do anything. I'm just going to the snow.

Those who grow up around snow don't have a strong concept of snow tourism. I grew up where it was a hundred-and-ten degrees in the summer and seventy in the winter and my concept of snow tourism is sterling. For Inland Empire dwellers, going to the snow is a standard outing like going to the beach. Drive an hour, get someplace nicer. Just instead of fleeing for the more glamorous part of Southern California on the coast, it's fleeing for the more glamorous part in the mountains. (And if you don't find Arrowhead glamorous, you are not from Riverside County.)

The romance of snow will never be marred for me by the mundanities of shoveling, or long, icy melts, or yellowing by dogs. (Nor enhanced by the providential magic of a Snow Day, but still.) I find it so exciting to step on snow and handle snow and--thrill of thrills--be snowed upon. I get a kick out of just being very cold and needing cocoa. Zooming across great mountains of the stuff is probably better suited to people who readily accept water in its solid state.

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