Today I had an adult snow day. After working the first half of the day in the office and seeing that the snow was not stopping, I went home to pajama bottoms and the couch. I was still working, though. I won’t complain about the privilege of working from home but it’s not the same as the snow days of my youth.
It makes me sound old but we really did used to listen to the radio for school closures when I was a kid. There was no internet and the local news wouldn’t be on until 11:00, so, we would listen for the most up to date list on the radio. My high school had the benefit of busing kids in from all over the city, so, if enough school districts closed, we had to close.
The irony of the snow day is that it’s too dangerous for children to go outside to go to school but as soon as it’s cancelled we all head outside to go sledding.
One of the best days of my life was getting a snow day on my birthday. That’s not hyperbole. I got the news, went back to sleep, then I got up and played the latest Madden that I had received as a birthday gift on my Sega Genesis. I’m simple man.
My biggest snow day wasn’t even because of snow. In the eighth grade there was an ice storm in Rochester. The ice weighed down branches which then broke and fell on power lines. We were without power for a week. A week without school but no television – a pretty poignant would you rather for an eighth grader. It ended up being pretty cool. We lit candles at night and rotated among neighbors’ houses for dinner. By the end of the week, power came back and life went back to normal among the piles and piles of branches along every street.
When the sidewalks were covered with snow, I would go out with my father to walk our dog Spot (I named her in kindergarten, shut up). I would sit in my plastic orange sled and hold on to the leash. My father would take a hat that Spot loved chewing up, show it to her, then take off running. I got my own little Oakdale Driver Iditarod. It was great.
If not tomorrow then someday soon, this snow will melt and turn to slush and it will be gross. Tomorrow we’ll all be back to work, remarking, “Isn’t it technically spring?” But I’ll always love a good snow day.
