When it is going to snow, you can smell it in the air. There is a cool bite, but not so cold that a deep breath stings going down. Just before the snow is the best time to walk outdoors, look up into an overcast sky and wait with anticipation.
No winter moment is more pivotal than the first snow of the season. The temperatures that have dropped finally pay off and the landscape is cloaked in white. The allure of snowy fun is ubiquitous, and it makes being indoors, by contrast, buttery and delightful.
Each of my past three years in a snowy climate has afforded me my first snow days and as I write, I am experiencing my fourth. Today I do not venture out to roll a snowman, nor do I mold a snowball. Instead, I sit in my apartment, face pressed up against the window, steaming up a foggy spot, and watch the flakes silently cover each spot of ground.
Cozying up in my place, a French film on in the background, I realize that I have never participated in a real snowball fight. Perhaps I can remember a few shoddy balls hurriedly gathered and tossed over the past years, but only the kind that don’t hold their shape long enough to hit the target in one discernible sphere.
My first year’s first snow, I spent off campus with my boyfriend at the time. As I left, the freshmen were pouring from the dorms to play as the flakes sprinkled down on a Thursday night. The second year, feeling down, I spent the day gazing out the window at some boys rolling a massive snowman with the carrot in an unorthodox place. The third time, I was once more at my apartment window, drinking chamomile tea and sitting with a friend. Looking out into that night, I felt just about as alone as I have ever felt in college.
“Non-participation” is a word that a friend helped me toward as I considered my relationships with the first snows. I love the idea of a snowball fight, and would in theory like to make a snowman with unorthodox accessories. Yet, any time opportunity has come up to engage in winter play, there has almost always been some explanation for passing. Being inadequately equipped with gloves and boots is an excuse that will not stand. It seems that my window-gazing and solitary retreats have repeatedly provided reason enough to stay back. But sometimes we are unreasonable.
Now my last first snow has passed. As it is my last year of college, with warmer destinations possibly in my future, I may never have another first snow. It will snow again, though, and I think this year it is finally time to peel my face away from the cold glass. There will surely be enough to make all the snowmen I could ever want, one on each block leading up to campus. I hope there will be enough to build snow barricades on the front lawn, stock an arsenal of balls for an entire afternoon and engage in full-throttle snow combat with anyone else not willing to gaze the day away.
