Snow

Hi again,

So as I mentioned last time, I'm home here in Little Silver, NJ, where it has just snowed about two feet. Last night, through this blizzard, my family was celebrating my brother's graduation from college. I was happy that many of the guests still came despite the pretty heavy snow and bad driving conditions. Upon waking this morning, I could not believe my eyes when I looked outside. We haven't had this much snow since the big storm of 1996, which everyone on the east coast remembers as the worst storm of recent memory. Take a look at my house:

My neighbor, who went to Georgetown and lived in DC before settling here, was telling me about her experience with the storm of '96. Washington was pretty much shut down, not only because of the snow, but because the budget hadn't passed so the federal government wasn't operating. Let me also say this: the thing about DC is, when it comes to snow, they don't know how to handle it. It has snowed every year the past 4 years, and I've never seen a plow. I guess somehow it makes more sense for them not to have one, but it snows every year and every year the city shuts down because the roads are terrible. 1996 was no exception. The roads were so snowy people were cross country skiing down them. Another one of my family friends who lives in Maryland told me her story from 1996. She was living in an area in Washington DC at the time, and one night during the 1996 storm she went skiing from bar to bar in Adam's Morgan (a neighborhood in DC with lots of bars) and people would buy her drinks when she came in with her skis. She even thought the photograph of a lone skier that made the cover of the Washington Post the next day could have been her skiing down Connecticut Avenue.

This year, snow just as high as in 1996 covers the streets in DC. I made it out before the storm, as did one of my roommate. My other roommate, however, was not so lucky. She is stuck in DC and waiting for the airports to open or trains to start running or something to happen so she can get home to Maine. While she was waiting, she took a picture of the street below our apartment building:

The city gets so crazy when it snows, I wish I were there to experience the fun, but I have my own fun here. As someone said last night, as you become older, snow kind of becomes an inconvenience, which is true. Your car gets plowed in. You can't drive anywhere because the roads are dangerous. It's too cold to do anything besides stay indoors. All those things are true, but snow is also when you can go sledding, build a snowman, build an igloo, or just look at how pretty it makes everything. To me, snow is still the best thing about winter. Whether covered in white, glistening snow or not, I hope everyone enjoys winter break!

--Abby