:: The Cruelest Season::
When you're a kid, snow is the greatest fucking thing on the planet. Better than jellybeans. Better than cuddly puppies. Better than cuddly puppies with jellybeans taped to their backs.
No weather pattern was better because it meant, at least in some places, there was the slight chance you'd get a day home from school. Every morning from late November until February at least one kid on every street in the country rushes to the window and peers out, hoping, praying, wishing that there's any hint of snow on the ground.
Hell, most of the time a heavy frost is enough to turn kids into the greatest salespeople this side of Ron Popeil.
"Let me tell you why I can't go to school today, mom. There's snow - SNOW! - and I could slip and fall on the sidewalk and crack my head open. Don't want to take that chance, right?"
" We won't learn anything anyways because nobody else will be in class. You don't want me to be the only kid there, do you?"
"I thought you'd agree with me - and because you did so in 15 minutes or less, not only will I stay home in my pyjamas all day playing video games, I'm also going to throw in a juicer and the Vego-matic slicer, all for just three easy payments of bacon, eggs, and juice. You can just bring it up to me in bed when it's ready. C'mon - it's a steal at twice the price!"
No two words outside of "Free candy" are as revered by children as "Snow Day." Sure, kids love the sun - it means water guns and shorts, and running through the sprinkler, and it means you might get to skip an hour of social studies in the afternoon in favour of going outside and playing kickball. But sunshine never sent no kids home from school, and a snowball made from the ice in the freezer just isn't the same as the real thing - even if it hurts just as much when you get pelted in the face with it.
But somewhere between elementary school and now, winter and snow got a lot less cool. Now I have to drive in it; people have to walk in it, work in it; freeze because of it.
And no amount of NFL snow games or hilarious side-of-the-road snowmen (I saw one with boobs this week...awesome) make up for it. But that said, I've always put up with it with little real complaint. Really, what am I supposed to do about it anyway? Fund global warming projects? Curse The Almighty? Punch Mark Madryga in the mouth? No, of course not.
So I'll sit down, shutup and take it when my car - moving as slow as ever - skids around a corner and smashes against the high sidewalk curb, sending me into a temporary tailspin.
And I'll not say a negative word when I slip on the steps outside a Whistler Boston Pizza, though the frosty concrete nearly sent me into a snowbank - and nearly caused me to pull every groin and groin-area muscle I have down there.
And I'll even bite my tongue when I'm forced to make a two-hour drive from one Northern Alberta outpost to a slightly-bigger, slightly-colder one, sans snow-tires, in the middle of a fucking blizzard. Then I'll zip it tight even when, once I get where I need to be, the cap on my engine's block heater cord is frozen so tight that it cannot be removed. Irony dually noted, winter.
However, after years of putting up with winter and all it's bullshit, I've had enough.
Earlier this week, both my parents were home mid-day. My mom is on night shift, and my dad happened to come home for lunch. After awhile in the kitchen, my dad was about to go back to work, and my mom - in need of a few hours preparation sleep before her first-ever 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift - was about ready to head upstairs for a nap.
Then, faintly in the background of the usual kitchen noise, my mom thought she heard something. A hurt animal, or something. Then silence. It must not be anything, my dad assured her. Then they both heard it again. Both then went to the window and gazed into the winter wonderland that had become the backyard. Off in the corner, by the old shed, my dad noticed a large, white puff, seemingly trapped between mounds of snow, barely moving, just standing still. Freezing.
Digby.
My dad didn't even remember letting him out in the backyard, but he must have. No big deal normally - Diggers rarely stays outside long in his old age (he prefers to pee on the hardwood floors instead). But one thing about this old dog - he really loves the snow. Loooves it. He'll race around in it - full speed ahead - for forever if we'd let him. But this time, he'd rolled around in it too much - or some had fallen on him from the shed or something - because his fur was caked in large icy, snowballs. So much snow that his poor little legs couldn't even move, so he'd just been standing out in the yard, whimpering and yelping, staring at the shed. Freezing to death.
My dad scooped him up quick-like, and brought him instead, where him and my mom spent the next half hour doing their best to warm him up with blankets and towels, all the while doing their best to brush all the snow off of him. I'm not veternarian (Hell, I can barely spell it), but from what my parents told me, he probably wouldn't have lasted much longer out there on his own.
It's just a damn good thing somebody heard him out there before going off to different parts of the house, where his quiet whimper would've fallen on deaf ears.
Yes, Digby is an old guy, and there's a good chance he won't be with us that much longer. I know that, much as I hate to admit it. But regardless of how much time somebody or something has left, freezing in the snow, cold and alone, is no way to go out.
And because of the coldest of seasons, Digby almost did.
So fuck you Winter, and the snow saucer you cruised in on.
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