February Snow, originally uploaded by mistersnappy.
When I was a kid I remember there being lots of snow. Lots and lots. Digging the car out kinda snow. Going sledging down West Heath in Hampstead kinda snow. I don’t recall everything grinding to a halt as much. I’m sure school stayed open, as I definitely remember the mother of all snowball fights in my primary school playground. But then I was about 8 and didn’t have to travel far to school. I didn’t have to battle on the Underground to work and the most important thing I had to do was build a snowman!
These days it just seems that we are ill prepared for the extremes of weather. Too hot and the rails buckle. Too cold and the points freeze. Buses can’t climb hills in the snow and cars boil in the heat of the summer. Schools close at the drop of a hat because lazy caretakers can’t be bothered to salt the playground. Maybe it’s too heavy and has become a health and safety issue?
A few years back Mrs Snappy and I took a winter break to the east coast of the USA where we drove in glorious sunshine from Boston to New York for the New Year. We were driven by a friend who was frantically trying to get us to our hotel, and then him on to his folks house, before the snow storm came in. As we drove all I could see was big blue American sky for as far as the eye could see. Even as we settled in to our hotel room for the night I checked one last time out of the window to be greeted by the Manhattan skyline topped with twinkling starts. A beautiful sight.
Nevertheless, the next morning the parking lot outside the hotel was filled with over 12 inches of fallen snow, some of which had drifted down to our end and had covered cars that were parked there. The point of this is, is that residents and local authority vehicles were ploughing through the snow and making way for other road users. Nothing intended to stop, nothing did stop. We were able to get our but from New Jersey to Manhattan and experience NYC under snow. The city didn’t stop, the trains ran, the buses ran and life went on.
So if this 12mm of snow should turn into 12cm and heaven forbid 12inches, I won’t get my hopes up for getting into work and will prepare myself for a day in the garden with the kids.
See… it’s not all hopeless afterall!
